Confrontation

A week had passed since Hallie had discovered the true fate of her Father. No longer was he just a memory, distant and only living on in her mind he was alive, breathing, walking and his being had transformed Hallie's life drastically. On the face of things Hallie's life hadn't changed at all. She was still working as an auror, she was still living with her Mother and she still politely flirted with the seventy year old cleaner who roamed the halls of the ministry. Yet none of it was the same.

The reason why Hallie had became an auror in the first place was because of her Father. She'd believed that he died protecting the family, died a trustworthy auror. His death had been an iconic part of her lip, iconic might not be the right word but it was. The moment the blonde had heard her Father stand in front of his family and take the killing curse was the moment that shaped her very being, it had given her an identity, a purpose. Her purpose was to become an auror and try her best to prevent people feeling the loss she'd felt. There was grievance and then there was grievance after your Father had been murdered. Evidently the foundations of Hallie's identity was a lie, nothing but mud that could no longer support the person she'd become. How could Hallie have the strength to seek justice when the reason she was seeking justice turned out to be one big performance?

Then there was her Mother. Amelia Cooper had not the foggiest information that her husband was in fact still alive, the man she loved lived on and the body that had been lowered into the ground had been an act of transfiguration, an ordinary object made to look like her husband had just taken the killing curse. It was a wonderful piece of magic, probably where Hallie had inherited her transfiguration ability but she couldn't trasnfigure the astmosphere between her and her Mother. Amelia knew something was up, Hallie was eating less, avoiding her but the witch never was one to invade her daughters privacy even if it mean't that the two barely spoke two words at dinner. It was clear that Hallie's life was not at all the same that it had been.


The auror had intended to visit Michael Tremain's house the day after she saw her Father boarding an elevator in the ministry. However she'd needed more time to take in what had happened than she'd hoped. Optimism had always been her downside and now it was letting her down. Begrudgingly she'd requested the Friday morning off work, deciding that enough time had passed and she probably should see her Father.

Confrontation never bothered Hallie, a part of her liked things being out in the open, it gave her a sense of transparency, kept things in balance and mean't you knew where you stood whatever the in-the-moment-pain was. One person she'd never thought the auror would confront was her Father, not since his passing, yet here Hallie was knocking on the door of Michael Tremain's house in Hogsmede. Robert Lupin had said Robert, or Rick as everyone had called him calls him, was staying with Michael and by ten o' clock the blonde was hoping he would be out of bed and ready for a conversation - not that she'd sent warning of her arrival.

Rick had been awakened early that morning by two things.  An early spring rain beating on the window, and the smell of food. Tremaine was fixing breakfast. The smell of maple drifted up the stairs.  Rick was appreciative of the better foods that Tremaine was fixing.  This morning it was french toast.

The Ministry had provided him with a house to use--next door to Tremaine, but Tremaine, transparently, always had some reason for Rick not to go there. Besides, much as Rick didn't want to get used to it or anything, it had been more than welcome to not be entirely alone. And Michael's house was anything but a good place to be alone.  Rick had thought he'd seen it all but when he saw that everything was enchanted and had a mind of its own, it had taken some getting used to. And it was more than a bit disconcerting to lose a hand of gin to the hat rack.

In the week that Rick had been in the older wizard's cottage, Rick was rested and he'd replaced perhaps a pound or two.  Tremaine's cooking skills, Rick thought, certainly excelled the cheap eats he'd often eaten over the years. It was also certainly better than anything Rick could cook.

The rain had stopped while Rick was showering, and, after breakfast, he found himself restless. Reading the dossiers again that Lupin gave him would hardly yield more information. Rick had read them a million times, knew the information now practically verbatim, and yet he found himself craving more.

Reaching out to the women he loved was not an option. Rick had been forced to be a dead man years ago. Resurrection was too late, he believed. More than a day late and a dollar short.  Actually, he saw no point in being back in England.  

He'd send owls to Lupin demanding to be put back to work.  Lupin wasn't responding. Rick knew what that meant.  Rick hadn't been treated in this fashion for years, but he still recognized it. Lupin was responding in a parental fashion.  Rick was being demanding, and Lupin wasn't going to respond to Rick's tantruming.  Lupin wasn't going to issue the next piece of business until he believed Rick was ready, period.

He'd ranted repeatedly at Michael over the last week, and this morning was no different.  It had started after breakfast when he'd asked about the mail.  No. There was no owl from Lupin--again.  The rant had started with colorful obscenities and had ended with Rick calling Lupin a stubborn old prick.

Michael had merely repressed an amused grin.  "You can't out-prick him, so you might as well stop trying," Michael said.  That bit of agreement had made Rick smile for a moment.  

"Look," Michael said, opening a kitchen drawer and laying a fresh pack of his own custom made Italian cigarettes in front of Rick, "You've got to find something purposeful to do.  You're making yourself crazy.  Here." He handed him a large gardening basket.  "Make yourself useful. How about lending me a hand and weed the garden? Can't plant any flowers until we get the weeds out. It'll do you good."

Weeding? Really? Wasn't there a spell for that or something?  Rick had gone outside begrudgingly and had found a metal bucket to turn upside down and sit on. He had lit a cigarette, deciding that Tremaine's cigarettes were better than the cheap weedy muggle brand he'd become accustomed to, and he had set in to the task of weeding Michael's flowerbeds.

In the process, though, he'd accidently let Michael's dogs out in the backyard with him. The enchanted footstools that believed they were cocker spaniels were happily rolling in the mud and barking. All seven of them. Otto, Faline, and their five dollhouse sized puppies. At least someone was happy.

"Oi!" Michael bellowed from the kitchen window. "You get to shampoo them! You've got no idea what its like to get mud out of Faline's pink chintz!"

"Yeah, yeah," Rick waved the older wizard away.

Nervousness was building inside Hallie as she awaited a response. Checking her watch until a minute had passed Hallie was about to knock one final time before walking back down the street and taking the floor network from The Three Broomsticks back home, that was until the sound of barking came from somewhere the other side of the house. They had to be Tremain's dogs and it didn't take an auror to realise that someone must be in the back garden with them.
 
 
Hopefully it's just Michael, maybe he's gone for a walk somewhere. Oh, I hope it's only Michael. Hallie thought to herself as she walked round the house and pushed open a gate leading into the back garden where seven dogs were yapping happily. It would have been nice to see Michael alone first to soften the fear bubbling within. He also might have been able to catch Hallie up on any details Robert Lupin failed to mention, as well as giving her a more useful insight into how to approach her Father because, after all, he had been living with the man for the past week.
 
 
Sadly her wish hadn't been granted. Instead that familiar scent of cigarettes met her nose. It's peculiar how one smell can bring a boat load of memories to the shore. The garden before Hallie's eyes didn't have any dogs. Instead there was a tiny blonde boy on a swingset and her Father pushing him, cigarette in hand. Hallie had been placed on the timeout step because she'd pushed Toby off the swings because she wanted a turn. Patience had never been her strong point.
 
 
A stream was now flowing through the garden, a set of rapids and branches hanging around Hallie as she sat on a boulder eating a chicken and cucumber sandwich that her Mother had made prior to the picnic. Toby was five and Hallie was seven. In between taking tiny bites of the sandwich Hallie was twirling a daisy in her fingers, counting petals and pulling one off every now and then. Toby meanwhile was already spooning heaps of yoghurt in his mouth, Amelia's voice suggesting he wipe his chin, whilst that family scent of cigarettes danced with the daisy pollen. Robert was chuckling at Toby, leaning forward to wipe the yoghurt from his sons face.
 
 
'Rick, mind that cigarette near the children!' Amelia had barked, taking it from her husband and throwing it into the stream, thoroughly entertaining her children whilst leaving her husband a little disgruntled. As much as Amelia had tried to stop the smoking she never succeeded and, evidently, chastising her husband hadn't left a lasting impression for that familiar scent was burning Hallie's nostrils. 
 
Oh God. That's him. What do I, do I go up to him? Do I say hello? Hallie hadn't thought through what she would say upon seeing her Father, the back of his head at least anyway. She'd gone through questions, identified loop holes where she needed extra information about what happened but in all honesty there was never any need for that. Hallie wasn't a planner she was a senser, she followed her instinct and went with whatever the moment suggested. 
 
A cough. That was her way of getting noticed. One tiny incoherent cough that couldn't be heard over the barking dogs. The dogs, however, appeared to have noticed her arrival and five cocker spaniel puppies came pounding towards her, one tumbling on its own feet.
 
'Hello.' Hallie said sweetly, crouching down to pat the puppies although mistaking this instantly as they tried to clamber onto her knees leaving muddy paw prints on the skinny jeans Amelia had washed the day before. 'Aren't you all cuties.' Hallie said to them, her mind completely taken away from the fact that her Father has only across the lawn. For now the puppies would suffice, calm her nerves. It was amazing what shadows puppies could bring light to.

Rick had already ripped out the weeds from several inches of Michael's flowerbeds when he heard a woman's voice behind him.  He hadn't heard anyone coming but with seven barking dogs....correct that, seven barking footstools...he hadn't been looking for it either.  He rose to his feet and turned.  

The blond woman in front of him was unmistakable. The eyes...they were Amelia's. The cheekbones were his.  The blond hair was from both of them.  God, this wasn't how this was supposed to happen.  He wanted to run, wanted to apparate out and pray she could somehow justify him as a delusion.  He wanted to speak, but the words failed him.  He could hear the pounding of his own blood pressure in his ears.  A fear response.  The only response he could readily identify.

Say something, you moron! His own voice in his head was sharp and critical towards him.  The silence felt like it had been hours and not several seconds.

"Hello," he said, his throat dry suddenly, his voice sounding a bit hoarse.  Maybe she wouldn't recognize him. Not bloody likely, you dope, his own self talk corrected him. She grew up. You just got older. In another day and time, they'd have been inseparable. She was surely going to recognize him as surely as he knew her.

"I, uh...this, uh..." he began.  Oh--the cigarette.  He quickly chucked it behind him into the flowerbed where is sizzled in the wet soil as it died. What was he, 12?  Jesus, pull yourself together, Cooper!


"Shit," he mumbled, not liking his own awkwardness.  Smooth, real smooth, Cooper. "Hallie.  I'm so sorry.  I am so, so sorry," he didn't know if he would ever find any other words.

She was lovelier that he had imagined, and the photo in the dossier did not do her justice. His little girl had lost all the childlike characteristics, and what struck him now was how much of a woman she had become.  And he'd missed it all.  Well, more than he'd wanted, at any rate.

Had she come here to see Michael? Had Lupin told her? How had she found him so soon? How had this happened? And did she really, truly even want to see him? Was she livid? Aching? Afraid? Confused? Hell, he was.  Was there any chance at all of a relationship with her? And what about Amelia? 

He glanced up for a split second at the kitchen window, hoping perhaps Michael had been expecting her.  Instead, he saw Michael give him one slow, steady nod--a silent gesture of encouragement. Michael simply turned and walked away from the window. Hallie had not come here for Michael.  This was deliberate. Lupin had, no doubt, told her.

He took a deep breath, trying to pull himself together.  Answers. She deserved, minimally, that. 

"I'll tell you whatever you want to know," he said finally, softly.

For a moment Hallie had been hooked on a wire, picked up and placed on the other side of the world where the grass was greener, the air was cleaner and she was feather light. The puppies smelt slightly, as all dogs do, but they were full of contagious happiness. It was hard not to be nervous with the light lick against your finger.

Hello. Paradise faded at the sound of the crisp voice coming across the lawn. The man she'd came to see had noticed her arrival when she off guard. That isn't entirely how she'd have liked it but at least she herself was slightly disarmed by the dogs and still in limbo between a false state of security and complete fear.

'Hello.' She replied, her tongue tracing over her suddenly drying lips. Her breathing was beginning to increase to that rapid state that it had been upon her walk from The Three Broomsticks and every inch of her body felt something. Hallie wasn't sure what this feeling was, it was a feeling that couldn't be described only experienced. Here she was saying hello to her Father, a man she's believed to have died, a mean she'd grieved over and now she was getting to have another conversation with him.

For a moment Hallie simply studied him, the shape of his lips, the eyes, the cheekbones that resembled her own. He was a lot older than she'd remembered and shorter, or perhaps she was just taller? Yes she was definitely the one who'd grown, still she wasn't quite his height. Toby, however, could have given Robert a run for his money. There was a gold band still around his ring finger, something Hallie noticed as he'd tossed the cigarette guiltily into the flowerbed.

'That would be nice.' Hallie replied politely after a minute or two, her eyes not swaying from his. This was it. The answers that she'd desired for the last week. The answers Hallie herself had thought up each night as she'd lay in bed awake. The answers that, in this moment, she didn't want. All that she really wanted was to remain in his presence.

One could argue Robert Cooper had never left her, that's what Hallie had always said to herself. In time of doubt, sadness she'd always looked inside of herself, clutched her heart and found him. Perhaps that feeling is only spiritual, a coping mechanism because for the first time in thirteen years Hallie was finally realising how her Father had never truly been with her. Staring into his eyes brought back that warm energy, that safety Hallie had felt as a little girl.

As Hallie stood there, complete perplexed, tears began to collect along her bottom eye lids, her lips trembled, her eyelids fluttered and a lump had swelled so large in her throat the only thing left for it to do was... Burst.

He saw the tears slip softly from her eyes, and he reached to wipe them away.  Then he saw the black, rich top soil covering his hands, and it jarred him back to reality. He froze. Perhaps she didn't want to be touched, at least not by him.  All of the years he'd spent wanting to touch her, and when he finally got the chance, he'd been up to his wrist in peatmoss. Sighing, he awkwardly and slowly withdrew his hand. Instead, trying to recover, he flicked his index finger at his jeans pocket, summoning his handkerchief and floated it to her. His child, and he didn't feel like he dare touch her.  He really hadn't scripted this moment, but he didn't think this was how he'd have chosen to write this if he had had another choice.

As the handkerchief reached her, he had more second thoughts, ones that were somehow a bit more anxiety ridden. The handkerchiefs in his duffel had gotten the attention of Faline, Michael's pink chintz footstool dog, and Michael had figured out that the female dog evidently liked Rick's cologne--a heady mix of rich woods and spices.  What if the scent took Hallie's memory back to more stuff of days gone by? Ugh.  He was buggaring this all up.  

"Um," he said gently, showing her his muddy hands as a silent apology.  "Let's go in.  Michael always has tea, and I can wash my hands." He motioned to her to follow. As he went in the kitchen door of Michael's English country cottage, he whistled to the dogs.

Michael came back through from the dining room.  "I'll get them," Michael said. Looking pointedly at Rick, he said, "Someone let them out and got them all muddy. I'll steam clean them this time."  Rick wished Michael would have had some brilliance to rescue Hallie and him from this agonizing awkwardness, but that apparently was not in Michael's plans. Michael was going to steam clean his furniture pets.

Michael saw Hallie and warmly kissed her cheek and brushed away a couple tears with his thumb, acting as if nothing was amiss. "Hello, my dear. You should take a puppy with you. The rose plaid one seems to have taken a shine to you. Make yourself at home, won't you?"  He passed behind them and spoke to the teapot.   "Pour the tea, and don't spill." Then he went outside to steam the dogs.

Rick saw the tea mugs and the teapot spring to life, and he set about washing his hands. "If you tell the pot how you like it, it'll take care of the milk and sugar for you," he said.  "Clever hex, however it happened. I rather like it."

The pot poured two mugs of tea and dropped one sugar and just a spot of milk into Rick's mug while it waited on Hallie's order.

"I hardly know where to begin," he said.  "And I'm betting our beloved minister has filled you in on part of it.  There are a million things I've wanted to say if I ever got this moment, and now, they're running all together, so forgive me if I buggar this all up.  Much as I thought about what I would say or do if this ever happened, I didn't honestly rehearse anything."  He paused and looked at her. There was something he needed to know.  "Tell me. Does your mother know?"  

He motioned her to follow him through to Michael's living room.  They both needed to sit. This was going to take some time. "Let's go sit, shall we?"

Noticing the muddy hands Hallie didn't say anything she was still slightly disarmed about the fact that she'd looked her Father in the eye. All the times when she'd gazed into them as a child: saying goodnight, asking for my cereal, trying to pretend she hadn't left the bathroom tap on and flooded the landing outside. All of those times had been so trivial yet before a week ago Hallie would have done anything to have gazed one last time in her Father's eyes. Now she had and they were exactly as she'd memorised them to be.

Not speaking Hallie followed her Father inside to find Michael there, of course, who smiled and brushed the gathering tears from her eyes. However once again Hallie found herself without anything to say, not even a hello. She hoped that Michael wouldn't seem her rude but anything that came out of her mouth wouldn't have been audible anyway, all sound would have been masked by the bubble in her throat.

Watching the teapot pour their tea, trying not to dwell too much on the sound of her Father's voice and the wash of warmth it surrendered her too Hallie finally managed to say one word: 'Same.' As her Father continued to speak the spoon poured one sugar and a spot of milk into her own mug.

Hallie didn't really listen to what Robert was saying, instead she pretended to be fascinated by the simply household charm the teapot and spoon appeared to be under. What she'd have given to be that very spoon. If she were she'd have no emotion. Hallie wouldn't be trapped in a vortex of nostalgia, happiness, confusion and pain; instead she'd be a puppet, told what to do and when to do it. Life would be so much easier if you were under the imperious curse and told how to feel, yes it'd be more restrictive but for the firs time ever Hallie was thinking it wouldn't be the worst thing.

Does your Mother know. Those four words distracted the auror from the spoon only realising that she hadn't listened to a word he was saying. Did he want her to know? Was he expecting Hallie to have told her Mother? Hallie was starting to think that maybe she should have told Amelia, it would have certainly made for a more awkward family reunion but at least the awkwardness would be less on Hallie.

Hallie didn't reply. Still no words could escape her as she remained stunned by where she found herself and who with.

'let's sit.' Hallie repeated rather vacantly collecting her mug of tea from the table and following her Father into the sitting room where she sank into an armchair across from Rick.

Hallie hadn't answered him, and by her body language he knew all he needed to know.  Amelia didn't know.  He had been fine with neither of them ever knowing but that was now not an option.  Nor was it an option to leave Hallie holding the proverbial bag about who was going to tell Amelia.  If Hallie and Amelia were as close as the dossier suggested, then Rick didn't want to put an unnecessary obstacle between them.  Hallie had had Amelia her whole life.  He was the odd man out.

"I'll tell her," he said softly.  "Now that you know, it isn't right that she doesn't know. And telling her isn't your job. Its mine. The last thing I want is to leave you to do it because then I become an obstacle between you. And I won't do that.

He paused, sighed, and took a sip of his tea.  "Where do I begin?  Well, I don't know if you remember I'm a metamorph."  He remembered well the games he used to play that amused the children and sometimes annoyed Amelia.  It had been both boyish on his part and also his joy of being a father.  He remembered Amelia sometimes being irked because she would say he was spoiling them.

"There are a couple of advantages to metamorphing.  You can amuse your family and friends," he said lightly. Then he grew a bit darker. "Or, it can be a powerful weapon.  And if you have an agent in a foreign country, having a metamorph doing espionage is a definite advantage.  They're a walking disguise kit. Even if the agent is captured, there's nothing to find. Makes them almost untraceable. Almost.

"Hallie, when I took the Unspeakable job at the ministry, I was young, newly married, and anxious to be able to provide for your mother and me.  We wanted to have children, and I wanted to be sure that you never went without.  The salary difference between being a mail clerk and an auror was too significant to pass up, and what they offered me as an Unspeakable was even more. I had no idea that they were going to send me on a mission that would change everything.

"There are parts of the mission I can't tell you. But we had a mole in the ministry.  Information was being leaked to some of our foreign enemies. Every time we got close, someone ended up dead.

"One of my friends mentioned he was close to figuring it all out, but he warned me it was darker and bigger than any of us imagined. He made me promise to stay away from him until he could turn over what he had.  The night before he was to meet with the Minister, there was a 'mysterious' house fire and he and his entire family were lost.

"He was one of my trainers. He taught me a lot of what I know.  But we had been seen together on multiple occasions. I was terrified for us--for our family--and I had a right to be. I was being followed.  They were presuming I knew too much, and I honestly didn't know squat. 

"So, I told your mother I was working overtime.  And, in a way, I was.  We were looking for a plan, a way to protect all the people, all the lives that were being threatened.  And I was desperate to make sure I had drawn them off me and off of any ideas they might have had to use you to get to me for whatever information they thought I had.

"I don't remember how our ideas got so evolved into the plan we ended up with.  I remember it was a lot of late nights in a conference room, and it sort of gained momentum on its own. I was the youngest agent in the room.  A lot of it went right over my head.  The next thing I knew, they had decided that I was the only choice they had.  They believed that my metamorph abilities were going to give them an advantage. They believed they knew how to keep you all safe.  There were two catches.  

"First, I had to separate myself from you until this was over or until they stopped looking at me.  And this was so deep and entrenched that it wasn't going to be resolved quickly or easily. The best idea the ministry had then was to use that need I had to draw them off you and send me in to infiltrate the very people who wanted to kill me.  In order to do that, to protect you, you all had to truly believe I was dead.  

"It wasn't an easy choice, not one I made easily or painlessly.  Had I known then what I know now about espionage, I might well have made a different choice.  But I don't own a time turner.  I can't go back and change it. And you have no reason to believe me, but coming back and turning your lives upside down? I'd have died before I did that.  I didn't choose to be back. I was brought back against my will.

"And, truthfully, I don't know what to do with that."

A silent sigh of relief escaped Hallie. All of a sudden the burden of telling her Mother was taken from her. She hadn't planned on ever telling Amelia for she wouldn't have wanted to cause her pain, to be the one to break the witches heart once more. Thankfully the secret Hallie was hiding was going to be set free, fly away with the chains strangling Hallie's throat whenever she sat opposite her Mother at the dinner table. A part of her felt free. The only pondering the auror had was whether Amelia would understand why her daughter hadn't told her as soon as she found out.

The mentioning of his metamorphagus abilities brought a smile to Hallie's face amidst the pain she was enduring sitting across from that very metamorphagus. Many times Robert would have humoured her, fashioning himself an extra large nose and tiny eyes or ears the side of elephants. Not that Amelia would appreciate this as Hallie did, her Mother was always the serious one, the bad cop who was probably thankful Hallie hasn't inherited her Father's metamorph abilities. Hallie, however, was most disappointed. Still, she did have a knack for transfiguration that had had her classmates staring green eyed at her.

Hallie couldn't dwell too much on the memories of her Father making himself look like Amelia behind her back though for he continued to talk and fill in the loop holes that the minister had left out.

Already the blonde was starting to see differences between the man she thought she knew and the man across her. The Robert Cooper Hallie had envisioned was a strong man fighting for justice, yes family was everything to him and that part still proved existent but the man Hallie thought she had known wouldn't have become an auror for the money but to make a difference and in that Hallie saw how different she was to her Father.

The whole reason Hallie had become an auror was to make a difference, to bring justice and prevent people from feeling the pain she had felt upon losing her Father to the hand of dark wizards. Never would she have done it for the money, as nice as the pay was. Heck even when she was married to Theodore she didn't push him to get a well paid job just a job, a job that would make her husband happy regardless of the fact that they were expecting-

A lump caught Hallie's throat. As insightful her Father's story was and as difficult as it was to comprehend he had missed a huge part of Hallie's life. He had missed her grow up, fall in love, feel heartbreak, become the leader of the order of the Phoenix. He hasn't walked her down the isle nor had he been there to pick up the pieces when her altercation with James Blood had left her without a child.

'Thank you.' Hallie finally said a few minutes after her Father had finished.

'There's so much I want to say.' The blonde continued in between taking sips of her tea to lubricate her throat and combat the sandstorm that had began to brew in her mouth whilst Rick had explained how he came to be alive.

'I know you've just explained why you were chosen for the mission because of you're a metamorphagus but why did you accept? Why did you leave us behind? Why did you think it was right to let us believe you were dead?'

The lion inside of Hallie was finally breaking through the bars she'd kept it down. All the anger from the grief she'd endured was starting to roar from within.

'Mum was heartbroke, I was, Toby was. Do you know what it felt like? Believing that you're Father had been murdered inches away from you whilst you're Mother kept you hidden in the closet from the supposed death eaters that had come knocking on your front door? What you did was wrong. You ruined our family. My Mother has never been the same since. I had to hear her sobs every night for a year after you died... Pretend to die. Then there came a point when she'd cried so much she'd dried up. She was an empty shell, emotionless, broken. I had to pick up the pieces and then me and Toby were attacked by a werewolf, he became one! Then I had to pretend to Mum that I didn't know what happened to Toby when he disappeared and vanished with the werewolf for five years. Maybe if you hadn't have felt it more important to leave us behind that wouldn't have happened!'

Hallie was now on her feet, tears of anger sparking along her bottom eyelid as she finally let out all the feelings she'd kept locked away since seeing her Father in the ministry a week ago.

'You missed me become an auror, which I became because of you. I believed that I was continuing your legacy, that I'd get to make a difference, save families from the pain we felt when we thought you'd been murdered by death eaters. It turns out my whole belief system is built on a lie, a big stage performance and-'

Hallie paused, catching herself on the lump in her throat.

'And you weren't there on my wedding day. I never had my Father walk me down the isle and g-give me awa-ay.'

At the thought of Theodore and the baby they'd lost Hallie collapsed to the floor, her hand clutching tightly at the base of her neck as she let all of her built up emotion flood from her. Every ounce of pain she'd felt: the grief of her Father, watching Helplessly as her brother was bitten by a werewolf, attending a memorial for her brother a year after he went missing because Amelia believed him to be dead, losing the love of her life and the pain only a Mother could feel when they lost a child right up until discovering her life had been a lie. All of that pain was finally escaping Hallie like it never had before so much so the air in Hallie's lungs felt toxic, fuelling her pain. She wanted it to stop. She wanted the whole world to stop.

Rick's sympathies for her seemed to suddenly spin into anger.  He had expected she would be angry, but she really was living in a world that he surely had not created. He wasn't sure where she'd gotten it exactly.  He couldn't see Amelia creating such fairytale twaddle for Hallie to believe in.  Nah.  Amelia was more the type to toss him under the bus if she were angry at him.  Even in her deepest grief, she'd not have filled Hallie with things that just weren't even partways realistic.  Much as he loved her, Hallie's vision of him was nowhere near the truth.  Nor was she really willing to listen to what he had to say. She had venom and plenty of it.  That much he was fine with. It was the utter audacity of what she had created in her mind that she believed he was that angered him.  No man was that holy.


He had tried to tell her about how he'd gotten into this, that he hadn't just tossed them aside, that it had been painful and not exactly his own will.  He had been young and impressionable.  He hadn't been much older than she was now when he had joined the Unspeakables.  How lovely for her that she had made no mistakes that she regretted or wanted forgiveness for.  However, she needed someone to blame for everything being topsy turvy.  And he was handy.


He saw her fall to the floor. How had she gotten to be an auror, of all things, if she were a fainter?  How did she finish her training?  He didn't say a syllable. He merely picked her up and laid her on Michael's sofa.


Then, determined on maintaining some sort of control,  he silently turned and started towards the stairs.  Michael's voice came to him.


"Where are you going?" Michael asked quietly.


"She didn't come here to see me. Not really.  And all I've learned is that she thinks her life would be better if I hadn't returned.  That and her head has been filled full of childhood fluff," he said sadly.  "I'm not God, but neither am I the devil. I see no point in explaining anything else unless she's ready to hear it."


"Running isn't going to change that," Michael said. "She knows what she knows."


"No. She knows what she thinks she knows. And most of that is a lie--and not a lie that I put into her head. I never told my children fairytales.  I told them stories of things I knew were true."


"No," Michael said gently, "Its how all legends begin. A bit of fact that gets inflated over time. You need to give her a chance to get to know you.  Wait.  You never read them Babbity Rabbity or any of those?"


"No.  Amelia was less rigid about that than I was. I told stories. I didn't read them. That, and I played with them with my metamorph stuff. That made Amelia crazy.  But I preferred it to talking rabbits. And I did give her a chance. She just doesn't want it," he said.  "I'll get my bag, obliviate her back into her happy little world and then you can take her home. She can go back to thinking I'm a superhero or a demon or whatever it is she thinks. I didn't ever want this for her or Amelia.  If you remember, I tried to get you all to fire on me so I really would be dead.  So they could believe whatever hogwash they'd been told. I didn't agree to destroy them even once, much less twice. If I need to be dead to them, then so be it."


"You didn't want to believe in talking rabbits, and now you live in a house with enchanted furniture.  A bit of Karma in that, Mate?" Michael said, intending to put Rick in check a bit. Then he asked, "You really sure that's your vote with Hallie, then?"


"You forget," Rick was hurting and bitter now. "I haven't had a vote in almost a decade and a half--on anything.  I don't get one now either."


"And what shall I tell Robert?"


"You tell him he can stick all this up his...."


"Now, now," Michael scowled. Rick bounded up the stairs to repack his duffel bag and then leave.  If  she really wanted him gone, he could certainly arrange that.


Michael sighed deeply.  He poured a wee bit of brandy into a glass and took it to Hallie.  Sitting on the edge of the coffee table, he was awaiting another bit of anger from upstairs when Rick found his wand gone.  Michael had pilfered it and hidden it.  Not even an accio could bring it back to Rick on a moment's notice.  Rick wasn't going anywhere--at least not magically. Michael followed Robert's orders, not Rick's, and Robert didn't want Rick dashing someplace offgrid. Angry as it might make Rick, he wasn't going to apparate off anyplace without Michael. Not yet.


"Take a sip," he told her quietly. "It'll help.  Then take a moment and get your thoughts together. You didn't expect this to be easy, surely. Oh, and cover your ears if he starts to bellow.  I've got his wand. He's about to find that out."