Title: Passing By

Author: Julian_Juliana

Summary: "This is not going to go the way you think." -Luke Skywalker, Last Jedi.

Rating: T+ for profanity and suggestive material

Author's Note: Please help me. I beg. I have issues. I'm also under no delusion I can pull off a Killmonger POV. For one, I've been struggling with male POVs these last few years. Second, I'm exotic as a piece of untoasted white Wonder bread. A legit white woman born and raised in the mountains. I have absolutely nothing in common with this character, and I could never properly understand him, even with my psych degree-my emphasis in research, not psychoanalytic, childhood trauma stuff. But the bunnies told me to do it anyway. They told me to try, and this 3,000+ word disaster showed up in my docs.

I've made this into a series with an undecided amount of one-shots.

Enjoy. At your caution. And please review. Unless your review is to tell me I did a suck-ass job at writing Killmonger. I already know that. I also know the ending's kind of...abrupt?

*Runs away*

He's in the area, all right?

Okay.

He's legit an hour out of his way, but he's got to put this shit behind him. Not because he owes the bitch anything but owes it to himself.

He glares at his phone and then at the house. Already, he's getting a headache. She gave the worst ones.

It's her parents' digs, but he doesn't think they're there. He wonders if she even really has parents. He's almost dead certain a hell vortex birthed her and that she's not even human. And ten years ago, that'd be crazy talk. Not now. There's all kinds of weird-ass fuckwads pitter-pattering the planet, and he wouldn't be a damned bit surprised if she were a card-carrying member of the freak club.

He bangs on the door.

Shit, her parents better not be here, or it'll just be awkward. He has unkind words to say, and her pops might not appreciate the opinion about his precious little princess who is neither little and definitely not a princess but a grown-ass demon possessing a solid eight.

At best.

All right. Eight-in-a-half.

That tight little ass, man.

And the accent.

The door jerks open and there Hermione Granger is.

Holding on her hip, a plump, wailing black kid wearing a bright orange, knitted sweater with the letter L embroidered on it.

"Your timing," she heaves, "has never been this impeccable, Stevens."

He stares.

His jaw drops.

He freezes.

He's unprepared.

Shit!

"Get that look off your face," Hermione snaps, adjusting the kid on her hip. He's got to be, like, five. What's he doing still clinging to her like a baby? Is she turning him into one of those pussy Gen Z vagrants? He's tugging at her shirt like he's still on the tit.

"Is he mine?" His voice totally goes up several unmanly octaves. A mixture of fear, anger, and—dunno, something else—hits him.

"No." She says the word like he's the stupidest person on the planet for even asking. Like why the hell would he even think this sobbing chocolate kid would be his? Does he go around asking all moms with black kids that? Is she just special?

"What am I supposed to think?" He gestures wildly at the kid.

"That maybe for real this time it's not about you."

He hasn't forgotten why they called it quits. If you can label what happened calling it quits. Some guys, they forget why they broke up with their incredibly interesting and pretty girlfriends. They forget the quirks. The bad shit. They forget how crazy they really were and start missing them. Yearn for them. Have a few beers and then hit up the girls' phones for nudes.

Erik is not one of those guys. Not one of his ex-girlfriends has he missed that much. He doesn't even miss the one he has now. She sent a selfie of herself while he was in the cab on the way here, tongue sticking out and one eye winking.

Eh, he thought and pocketed his phone.

"He's Blaise's."

That doesn't make him feel better. If anything, he's more pissed off. There's a code, damn it, and that asshole took a shit on it.

Erik checks for a ring and fuck. That fucker didn't even have the balls to put one on her.

"Yeah?" He takes a step forward, jutting his chin out. He's ready for a fight. He's ready for a fight with a guy who's not even there. He needs to cool off a bit, but shit, he wants to know. "Where is he, huh?"

Hermione stares at him like he's crazy. Like he's crazy. She's always stared at him like that. He remembers when he lost those teeth in the field and chose the gold ones as replacements. He smiled at her proudly, and her expression spoke volumes.

You're never meeting my parents, her face said, horrified smile frozen in place.

It was like she internally screamed all the time at him, Why can't you be normal?!

When she's the one who's a grade A nut.

Even Blaise agreed. And that dude had to have been snorting Comet as a kid.

Hermione sets the kid down and swats him on the butt. "Go play," she says.

"Okay," he cries dejectedly and continues spewing snot, tears, and saliva as he waddles off.

"So," Hermione stretches her arm and then thrusts her hips and torso forwards, stretching out her back. He's reminded that she didn't start off as one of those white, yogi women but did evolve into one pretty damn fast not long after he met her. But, damn, she's looking fine. She's pushing a nine, even covered in child debris. "What do you want?"

"I want to talk to Blaise." Yeah, no. That wasn't his initial plan, but he'll get there. Hermione will get hers, too, no worry there.

She frowns, and her arms fold. "He's, like, eighty miles that way." She nudges her head in a nonsensical direction.

"He's not even living with you? He won't even let you and the kid stay with him?"

Her eyes narrow like she's thinking, and he remembers the first time he told her to stop doing that.

It became the last time.

"You think," her fingers rotate and circle, "Blaise and I…did things?"

Ah, yeah. It's almost three o'clock in the afternoon in the suburbs. Hermione's not going to say expletives like fucked or even PG terms such as slept together. Her mom's manically Christian and tried to raise her hell spawn proper as best as any middle-class woman can. Poor woman. He feels her in a way. Couldn't have been easy being handed a demon instead of a daughter thirty-six years ago.

"We didn't," she clarifies, even clearing her throat. "I'm watching his son until his mom comes to pick him up."

Erik's more relieved than he should care to be, but he can't stand the thought of Blaise touching her. Blaise hadn't liked her at all. Only tolerated her because of reasons Erik can't really remember.

Girls like her, he does remember Blaise saying who never really elaborated.

One time he added an ugly to the beginning of that, and Erik used to wonder what happened between the two of them that made him spew such bullshit. Hermione Granger is a lot of things. Ugly isn't one of them. She's an eight and sometimes nine. In the throes of a good fuck, you can't put a number on her.

They must've, he doesn't know, let bygones be bygones if she's watching his kid.

"Daphne." Huh. She and Hermione weren't cozy at all. Daphne loathed her, he's sure. Some soap opera drama tracing back to boarding school, he thinks.

A wry look flashes across Hermione's face. "No. They never worked it out."

Never wor—

What? She's talking to him like she thinks he knew Blaise and his girl split. He didn't know. Hell, until now, he figured they got marr—

Wait, that's right. He does remember they broke up. The memory's hazy, but he remembers. Big argument. Shit and insults were thrown. Hermione was there, tugging on his arm saying they should leave, and they did.

That dull thump in his head sharpens.

"Why are you here?" Hermione tilts her head and crosses her arms.

Fuck the headache. He can do what he came here to do, leave, and down a painkiller. "Yeah." He takes a bold step forward. "You were—"

Hermione steps passed her threshold. They're inches apart. She's not backing down. She's not afraid of him. Other women he's been with, they got nervous when he'd lose his temper. With Hermione, she'd just stare at him like a disappointed mother would to her kid. She stared at him like he purposefully wet himself to get attention.

She never indulged him.

Not once.

Back then, there came a point when he knew she didn't care. That she didn't give a solitary fuck what her ancestors did to his and when he said as much…

She had pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head, not looking at him anymore. She'd been trying to tell him something before he went off on her. She'd had a bad day. Was sick that morning and was late for work. Got chewed out by her boss, had to leave work because she couldn't keep fluids down. Boss was an ass. Job in jeopardy. Blah, blah, blah. White girl problems.

"You know what," she said after ten seconds. "Never mind."

She got up and walked out of his apartment.

"Hey, text me when you get home," he called after her. Woman had to go through a dangerous part of the city to get to her apartment and twice she almost got mugged. Both times got out of it somehow without a scratch.

The next morning, he had to leave for Iraq. Just a month kind of gig. When he came back, her apartment was empty, and she changed her phone number. She deactivated her Facebook and deleted all her email accounts, so he had no legit way of contacting her. After grilling the landlord, he got enough information to know she came back here to England.

He never tried to find her until now. She was obviously done with him, and he was glad to be rid of her. He took a chance on a white girl, thinking her different than the rest, and she really hadn't been. At the end of the day, she favored self-help books, pumpkin spice lattes, yoga pants, and was unapologetically embarrassed by him.

If he were even more suspicious, he'd think she cast a love spell on him because why else would he go for a number eight on the all-white-meat menu? He even told her that once in one of their later fights, and she threw up her arms and cackled. Like a for real cackle. Like a mix between Maleficent and the Wicked Witch. It was not even close to the cute girly giggle he was partial to.

"A love spell, Erik?" She shook her head and put her hands on her hips. "A love spell indicates that you would love me, and we both know you don't."

For three years after going their separate ways, she was off social media. The only outlet he's aware of now is that she's got a Pinterest account full of complicated yoga positions and Paleo and Keto recipes.

Enough reminiscing. He's got to get back to London. He opens his mouth and…she's not even looking at him. She's looking passed him and then frowning at her watch.

"Is it really two?"

Erik looks over his shoulder. A silver minivan has pulled up and the side door slides open revealing a load of kids. One of them unbuckles her seatbelt and then hops out, hitting the sidewalk with a slight stumble. She's got Beauty & the Beast band aids on her knees and glasses on her face. Her wild hair looks like it's fighting to escape her braid.

Like the boy in the house, she's black. Unlike the boy in the house, her problem doesn't seem to be emotional but physical. Gravity's not her friend. She's balancing five, thick-ass books in her arms, and her backpack isn't even zipped all the way because it's stuffed.

"She belong to Blaise, too?" he asks.

Hermione tears her eyes off the girl to stare at him like he's the stupidest again. "No."

She storms past him and meets the girl halfway, taking the books and the backpack. The girl smiles breathlessly, playfully wiping her forehead with the back of her hand.

"Thanks, Mummy."

"Leo's here. Go play with him."

The little girl lets out a groan. "But he's, like, the biggest baby everrrr." She takes big stomps up the walkway, pausing next to him to look up. "My uncle's got glasses like you."

She slides her own specs up to rest at the top of her nose, disappearing inside the house. Hermione drops the bag and the books off to the side in the entryway. She closes the door behind her, so it's just them. "What is it you have to say to me, Mr. Stevens?"

That's not going to work. Not now.

His traitorous dick twitches.

"What's her name?" It's the first thing that falls out of him.

Her mouth opens and then shuts. She twists the doorknob and opens the door. "It's about tea time anyway. Would you like a cup?"

He really can't. He's got to go.

He follows her into the house. Her childhood home. He's not sure what he expected, but bare walls and sparse furniture isn't it. Stacked, labeled boxes are everywhere. He looks at the mantle above the fireplace. There should be pictures on it of Hermione in the throes of her overly privileged girlhood. Her parents would definitely be the type of folks into that kind of decorating.

"Stop crying, you big baby!" shouts the girl from somewhere upstairs.

"But I want to be Darth Vader!"

"Darth Vader doesn't cry like a pussy!"

Hermione pauses, glares upstairs and then sighs, shaking her head and shuffling forward.

The kitchen is in the same state as the rest of the house. Labeled boxes. There's not even a dining table but kitchen stools at the island.

"Your parents are selling the house."

She fills the tea kettle, angrily twisting the knob. "My parents are in Australia."

Right. That's right. He forgot. But they kept the property.

"I was living here, but I'm selling the house."

"So you're moving there." He nods. "That's cool." It's really not. There's terrifying shit there. Gigantic spiders and snakes with jaws large enough to engulf a kid.

He frowns at the ceiling.

"I'm moving but not there." She sets the kettle on the stove and removes two teacups from a box.

"You were never going to tell me," he finally accuses.

The shock's worn off. Mostly.

"Do you blame me?"

"You were never going to tell me," he repeats. "You don't think I deserved to know I got a kid out there in the world?"

Hermione's gaze rests on him. Steady and considering. "No," she finally says.

Demon. It's what she is. A cold-hearted bitch chilling under dewy brown eyes and freckles.

"I call her Jane," she supplies.

"You call her Jane." The name tickles something in his brain. Hermione's cousin. He never met her, but Hermione would talk for hours on the phone to her cousin in New Mexico. Her cousin Jane. Her hot cousin Jane.

That's right. He even used to call her that. Hot Cousin Jane. Hermione would roll her eyes and laugh her cute laugh when he'd say that. She had a picture of the two of them in their undergrad days on her nightstand back at her old apartment.

"It's her middle name," she says and then blushes. "I was feeling—sentimental and probably drugged, I guess—when she was born. Her first name is Erika."

With that sinking in, she pulls a tray of kid-friendly finger sandwiches out of the fridge. She offers him one. "Nutella, strawberries, and marshmallow cream. Absolutely teeth-rotting, but it's her favorite, too."

Her face scrunches and she gnaws on her thumbnail before saying, "If you were going to show up at all, Erik, I wish it would've been sooner. Maybe even later."

He takes the tiny sandwich, frowning. "You used to make these for me. You sent them in those care packages." He had forgotten. How? They were the highlight of those missions. "Somehow they'd still be fresh when they got to me."

For whatever reason, he can't bring himself to eat the sandwich. He's afraid. He doesn't want to remember more and as ridiculous as it sounds, the sandwich might make that happen.

He sets the sandwich down.

Hermione sighs like she's made a decision.

There's a tight feeling in his chest knowing he's got a kid upstairs right now, but it changes nothing for him when it comes down to it. He's just another guy who didn't mean to get a girl pregnant. Shit happens. You move on, and he's come this far to let something as basic as this interfere.

Hermione looks both devastated and exhausted and her actual age, and he's seen this look on her before, but it's worse this time. She licks her lips and gathers herself, and it's like he's watching her put her big girl pants on.

"Your suspicions about me are true."

They are?

"You were right about me? About how off I was. How different. I tried hiding it from you. Sometimes I even had to make you forget things which is probably why you hate me because you can't remember…" She cups her forehead and swallows. "With the Sokovian Accords—"

He flinches at the mention of them, the only thing making sense that's coming out of her mouth.

"—I'm not coming forward. I'm not signing them. They'll put me and Jane under a microscope for the rest of our lives. And it's only a matter of time before she has her first accident."

"What the hell are you talking ab-"

The kettle whistles, and she turns away from him to pour the boiling water into the teapot. Steam rises, and she rubs her nose, sniffling. "Careful," she supplies. "It's strong."

After pouring him a cup, she trusses it up the way he likes. A splash of tea. The rest milk and honey. He brings the cup to his lips.

"I'm sorry," she tells him as he knocks it back like a shot. Her brow wrinkles. "You always drink it awfully fast. It's better when you don't."

"I…" He puts the cup down. "I gotta go."

She swipes at her nose and then rubs beneath her lashes. "I'm glad you stopped by."

"Yeah, I…uh." His head throbs. "Was thinking about you. Missed you."

No, he doesn't. He didn't. He never has. What's going on?

"You're going to stop that. For real this time. The tea's strong."

This isn't right. She's…She's done something to him.

Again.

She's done this before.

"What've you do—"

She's in front of him now. Cupping his face and making shush noises. "You keep coming for me, Erik, and I think we're both tiring of it. Plus, you saw Jane this time and with us leaving in a few days…"

"I've come here before." His voice doesn't sound like his own, and his skull feels like it's being split open. Blood's got to be coming out of his ears.

"The pain will pass, and you won't remember me at all."

And she's right. For a few days, she's right. The pain subsides, and his surroundings fade. Erik wakes up in his hotel room to Claue calling him. He's been out since noon and now it's almost four. He's got an hour to get to the museum.

Man, he must've needed the z's, but now his head's throbbing from too much sleep. He tosses back a few painkillers.

Days later, with the spearhead in his chest, and realizing too many things at an inconvenient time, he remembers everything.

The End

A/N: Now go check out Passing By: No Good Deed. :)