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“Mummy, where are we going?”
Smiling down at her daughter, Hermione said, “We’re going to the holodeck.”
“What for?”
“Do you remember me telling you about my friend from school?”
Georgia Grace nodded. “Yeah, mummy.”
“Do you remember me telling you about one of my Ravenclaw friends, Anthony Goldstein?”
“I do,” Georgia Grace said with another nod.
“Well, Anthony was Jewish, and he celebrated Hanukkah instead of Christmas,” Hermione explained.
Georgia Grace smiled. “Oh, okay.”
“And now that you and David are older, I wanted to show you this special time in the Jewish calendar.”
“Where is he?” Georgia Grace asked.
Hermione noticed the thoughtful expression on her face. “He’s with your daddy and your sister. Your daddy is meeting us at the holodeck with David, and then your daddy is going to take Minnie back to our quarters while we visit Hogwarts.”
Georgia Grace’s eyes lit up. “We’re going to Hogwarts?!”
“Yes, we are,” Hermione replied with a nod. “We will be visiting a moment from my childhood where Anthony showed me and some of our other friends how he and his family celebrate Hanukkah.”
“That sounds exciting, Mummy.” A frown slipped over her lips. “But why isn’t daddy and Minnie joining us?”
“Because your little sister is too small to understand right now and someone has to keep an eye on Daddy, so who better to do that than your little sister?”
Georgia Grace laughed. “Mummy! That’s funny!”
“But true,” a new voice said from in front of Hermione and her daughter who looked up.
“DADDY!” Georgia Grace exclaimed as she saw her father and siblings ahead of them. She let go of Hermione’s hand. The little girl ran over to where the rest of their family were standing near the entrance to the holodeck.
Len scooped his eldest up into his arms. “How are you doing, my little peach?”
Georgia Grace giggled. “I’m good, Daddy. But I’m sad that you and Minnie won’t be joining us.”
“I am too, but like your mum said, someone needs to keep an eye on me.” He winked at his daughter. “Plus your sister isn’t ready yet. We’ll do this again when your sister is older and I’ll join everyone. How does that sound?”
“Good, Daddy!”
“David, are you ready to go, love?” Hermione asked as she joined the rest of her family.
The little boy smiled up at her. “I am, Mummy.”
“Mummy, wanna go,” a little voice said from behind her brother.
Hermione knelt down to be on the same level as her youngest. She kissed her youngest’s forehead. “Not this time, little love. We won’t be gone long. Plus, I think your daddy was going to take you to the medical bay and show you around.” She looked up at her husband with a raised brow.
Len looked down at her. “Oh, I was, was I?”
Henrietta Minerva turned wide eyes up at her father. “Daddy! Pwease!”
Setting Georgia Grace back down, Len picked up his other daughter. “As long as you promise to be a good girl, Minnie.”
“I miss,” the little toddler said.
“Good girl.” Kissing her cheek, Len turned to look at his wife, who had finally stood back up. He whispered, “You owe me.”
Hermione chuckled. “Well, if I can get my slave driver of a boss to give me Christmas Eve off, then maybe we can get someone to watch the kids, and we can take that little trip to Miavana, Madagascar like we’ve been discussing.”
Len grinned at her. “I guess I’ll have to have a talk with this slave driver of a boss of yours and get him to see sense.”
“You do that, and I’ll make it up to you for taking Minnie to the med bay,” Hermione said. “I swear she’s going to take after the two of us and become a doctor.”
“Deal, and I think you might be right.” Taking a step back, he looked down at their two eldest. “Now, you two be good for your mum,” he raised an eyebrow, “you hear me?”
“Yes, Dad,” David James said.
“Of course, Daddy,” Georgia Grace piped up.
“And make sure to listen to what she tells you,” Len reminded before he kissed Hermione’s cheek. “Come on, Min. Let’s go to the med bay.”
“Yay!” Minnie squealed, clapping her hands together as Len started making his way down the corridor.
Turning to her twins, Hermione grinned. “Are the two of you ready to go?”
“Yes, Mummy!” Georgia Grace exclaimed, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet.
David James grinned. “I am, too.”
“Then, let’s do this,” Hermione said before turning to the console of the holodeck.
Pressing the buttons on the screen she needed, Hermione then tapped her wand against the bottom right corner of the screen activating the scene from her past.
The doors to the holodeck opened, and Hermione entered with her two children right on her heels.
“Mummy, it’s beautiful!” Georgia Grace whispered in awe as she looked around them.
The three of them had left the Enterprise behind and stepped into a transformed Room of Requirement from when Hermione and the former Dumbledore’s Army would meet to practice.
“Look at this!” David said as he pointed towards a practice dummy. “It’s so cool!”
“We would use this to practice spells that Harry taught us on it,” Hermione explained. “I can’t tell you how many times we blew it apart and had to repair it just to blow it apart again.”
The sound of voices on the other side of the wall drew the trio’s attention.
“Mummy? Who is it?” Georgia Grace asked as she stepped closer to Hermione.
“Some of my friends from school. This is what I was telling the two of you about, where we learned about Hanukkah from Anthony.” She gestured for her children to step closer to the small group that had sat down on the sofa and chairs that sat off to the side of the room. “I knew most of what went on during the festival as my parents’ assistant was Jewish, but Anthony taught me about something I didn’t know about, and I figured it would be something the two of you would enjoy. Let’s sit down and watch.”
Hermione led her children the rest of the way to where the group was sitting. The two sat on a rug in the middle of the group as Hermione stood off to the side, watching quietly. She felt her heart constrict as she looked at the people surrounding her children. It had been years since she had last seen them and this little scene of friendship and understanding of another culture had Hermione missing them all terribly. It was less than six months later that their headmaster would be dead and another two months after that Hermione along with her best friends would be on the run trying to hunt down pieces of Voldemort’s soul.
Her children didn’t know about the war or that Hermione had been torn from her friends and family and thrown over two hundred years into the future, but she knew that talk would come when they were older. At nearly six years old, Georgia Grace and David James were not mature enough to learn about that part of her life, but they did know that she was a witch. That topic had come up a little over a year ago when both children started displaying bouts of magic again. They had when they were around Minnie’s age, but Hermione and Len let the two of them be in awe of what had happened.
“Mummy! Mummy! That Ant’nee guy is making waffles!” David exclaimed as he pointed excitedly behind him at the group.
“Yes, he is,” Hermione laughed. She pushed off from the wall and knelt in front of him. “But why is he making waffles?”
David bit his lower lip before saying, “Because they are tasty?”
Hermione tried her best to not laugh at her son’s questioning response. “Well, they are tasty, but that’s not quite the reason why Anthony is making them.”
“Then why is he making them, Mummy?”
Settling onto the floor, Hermione patted the ground next to her. Once her son was seated, she worked towards answering his question. “Did you hear the part where Anthony talked about Hanukkah also being called the Festival of Lights?” At David’s nod, she continued, “The holiday is a way to bring light along with joy and warmth into the home. Back when this memory happened for me, it was also a way to bring all three into the community too. It’s a bit harder now, especially for those that are out in space like we are, but it still happens back on Earth from what I understand.”
“Mummy, you are so better at explaining this,” Georgia Grace said as she joined her mum and brother.
Hermione laughed. “I think that might be because Anthony didn’t know that he had two little ones listening in on his story.”
“Oh, that makes sense,” she murmured as she sat on the other side of her mum.
Patting her daughter on the knee, Hermione asked, “Did you see all of the objects that Anthony had with him?”
David’s eyes lit up. “I did! And he pulled them out of his bag like Mary!”
“Yes, he did. Now, the menorah is used for the light with the candles, and they eat many oil-based foods, but the congregation Anthony comes from makes waffles as one of those foods. That tradition stemmed from a city called Amsterdam, which if you remember from one of your geography lessons is the capital of the Netherlands, and has spread to some congregations in England and a couple of congregations in the States.”
“That’s where Daddy’s from!”
Hermione nodded. “It is. Well, the tradition of making waffles comes from an excerpt in a poem created by Moshe de Yehuda Piza as a song. In the song, there is a specific phrase, “miracle and wonder” which in Hebrew is nes va-fele. Now, what does that second word sound like?”
“Waffle?”
“You’re right, David! Vafele is Hebrew for waffle,” Hermione replied with a grin.
The scene at Hogwarts disappeared, leaving the trio sitting in the unaltered holodeck.
Hermione stood up. “Shall we go find your father and Minnie? And see what they’re up to?”
“Yes!” The two children exclaimed as they jumped up and followed their mother to the entrance to the holodeck.
“Mummy?”
“Yes, dear.”
“When is Han…” Georgia Grace trailed off as she tried to figure out how to pronounce the word.
Hermione waited patiently for her daughter as she knew she didn’t like being told.
They were nearing the turbo lift when her daughter finally spoke again, “When does the Festival of Lights start?”
“It starts tomorrow,” Hermione replied as they stepped into the lift. She called out their floor before asking, “Why do you ask?”
Georgia Grace looked up at her. “Can we celebrate it?”
“You want to celebrate Hanukkah?” The little girl nodded. Hermione looked at her son and raised an eyebrow.
She didn’t even have to ask him as he was nodding his head enthusiastically. “Can we make waffles too?”
Hermione didn’t even try to hide her smile. “Let me talk with Daddy and do some more research, and I’ll see what we can come up with. How does that sound?”
The children jumped up and down excitedly, and as the door to the turbo lift opened on their floor, they darted out, nearly running over Uhura in their haste to get to their father.
Hermione apologised, “I’m so sorry, Uhura.”
“It’s okay,” the other woman replied as she allowed Hermione to also leave the turbo lift. “They are certainly excited about something, aren’t they?”
“I showed them something from my childhood, where a friend explained a holiday from his religion, and it involves making waffles,” Hermione explained. “Now, they want us to have our own Hanukkah celebration and—”
“Make waffles?”
Hermione laughed and winked. “How did you know?”
“Lucky guess,” Uhura replied.
“Lucky guess indeed.” Hermione nodded in the direction her children had taken off in. “I should probably catch up with them.”
Uhura nodded. “Probably. Have a great day, Hermione.”
“Thank you. You too, Uhura.”
Hermione left the other woman and followed her children. By the time she caught up to them, they had entered their quarters and were talking excitedly to Len.
Catching sight of his wife, Len laughed. “So what’s this I hear that we’re going to be celebrating Hanukkah this year?”
“It was your daughter’s idea,” Hermione replied with a shrug. She smiled innocently at Len.
“Uh-huh.” Len didn’t sound the least bit convinced. “And we’re making waffles too?”
“Yup, they’re part of the tradition.”
“It’s a good thing I like waffles then,” Len murmured as he wrapped his arms around Hermione’s waist.
She hummed as she wrapped her arms around his neck, “Mm-hmm. Were you able to talk to my boss while you were in the medical bay?”
Len nodded. “I was. And he’s agreed to give you Christmas Eve off this year.”
“That’s Great! I’ll see if Chekhov is available to watch them. You know how much they love spending time with him. If he is, then you’ll be getting Christmas in Miavana, Madagascar as a heartfelt thank you from me.”
Len snorted. “Darlin’, it’s a good thing I love you so much.”
Hermione kissed his cheek. “I love you too, Len.”
“Ew!” Georgia Grace exclaimed, covering her eyes.
“No kissing!” David James moaned as he jammed his fists into his closed eyes.
“Ew! Kiss!” Minnie repeatedly babbled as she banged on the table of her bouncy chair.
Hermione and Len laughed as they pulled away from each other.
Len leaned down to whisper in her ear, “No kissing now, but in Madagascar? That’s a different story,” before turning his attention to their young children.
The sight of her husband tickling Minnie as she giggled uncontrollably had Hermione grinning. She loved her little family dearly and was thankful that she had found such a kind and open-minded man in Len that he wouldn’t think anything of it when their children asked to celebrate Hanukkah. Now she just needed to do some more research so they could celebrate adequately and be able to honour the traditions as her childhood friend had done.