The doctors cleared Dania for work back in April. Not full-time, though, part-time only. She was allowed an absolute maximum of ten hours of low intensity work a week, although they highly encouraged her to keep it less than five.

It wasn't much, but Dania would have happily gone out looking for a part-time job working as a temp, a low level clerk, a cashier or something else along those lines. There was only so much Dania could take of being cooped up in the house all day for months on end before she began going stir-crazy. Having a part-time job, even if it was only for a few hours a week, would be great to keep her busy and slowly start accumulating some of her own money, but not everyone agreed with that assessment.

Namely, Mrs. Evans. No amount of pushing, arguing, or even pleading on Dania's part could get through to the older woman. Mrs. Evans refused to allow Dania to get any job, not even volunteer work.

"You can't do that," The woman said as if the very thought of it offended her sensibilities, "Not in this state, you're still recovering! I can't let you go out there like that?"

And she would shut down any conversation Dania tried to engage her in.

"What if-"

"Nope!"

"I've been looking at the classified ads and-"

"No, you can't."

"I could try-"

"How about we talk about this later?"

"And when would later be?"

"Next year seems like a fine time to pick up this discussion."

Dania exhaled sharply in frustration as she pinched the bridge of her nose between her thumb and pointer finger. This was clearly not working. She was going to have to try a different approach.

"Can I say something in full, please?" she asked, removing her hand away from her face and schooled her features. Dania couldn't snap and air out her anger. Not if she wanted to resolve this back and forth now.

Mrs. Evans looked like her first instinct was to deny her, but something held her back. She stood pensively for a moment before slowly nodding, giving Dania permission to speak.

Dania straightened her back, and layed out her case.

"First off, I was given permission by doctors to go back to work almost three months ago."

At this Mrs. Evans opened her mouth but Dania raised a finger to stop her, "I'm aware that you didn't want me to immediately start working," Dania continued, "which is why I agreed to a grace period. But that's all it was. A grace period. Secondly, I am a grown woman who can make her own decisions on her health and well being, and I think it's time for me to return to the workforce."

"No," Mrs. Evans said tersely as clear worry wormed its way into her body language, "You're still sick." she reiterated, "What if you're at work and you feel faint? Or have another migraine? Or get overworked and push yourself too hard? What if you get nauseous, and can't hold anything down? What if it's too soon, and too much for you to handle? What if you get hurt again-"

"And what if I walked outside right now and got hit by a bus?" Dania interrupted, then immediately backtracked when Mrs. Evans's face went white as a sheet. "Not that I'm saying I'd do something like that on purpose. But I can't spend my life clinging on to the 'What ifs'. Sure, those things could happen. Heck, they probably will. However I am not walking into this blind. I know what to do in those situations, and I will make sure that my employers know about my condition.

I understand that you are worried about me, but I can't just stay stuck in this house for the rest of my life."

Mrs. Evans let out an indignant huff, "Tuni, you are not stuck here here. You go to the library every week, you get driven everywhere that you want to go, and take a walk around the neighborhood on a daily basis. Oh, speaking of which, I have been meaning to talk to you about that habit, because I do not approve of you going out in the pouring rain."

"That was one time." Dania gritted her teeth, "I didn't realise it was supposed to rain that day. And can we not change the subject here?"

"You do not need a job right now," Mrs. Evans said with a level of finality told Dania that she wasn't going to win this one, "Right now you need to rest and recover. You can work later."

Dania grimaced. They were just talking in circles; she was going to have to change her approach.

"Alright," Dania conceded, "I won't look for a job right now, but only on the condition that I get an exact date of when you will feel comfortable with me working again. I don't want a vague timeline that can be continuously pushed back."

Mrs. Evans stared at Dania, mulling over the proposed course of action. "Perhapes," Mrs. Evans said slowly with a slight tilt of her head. Dania pounced at the opening, and the haggling began.

"How about August?"

"No! That's barely two weeks away! That's nowhere near enough time!"

"August 31st then."
"August 31st of next year."

"That date is too far off, and my goal is to start working again before January."

"After Christmas, and not a moment before."

"I propose September 15th. It would be an excellent way to celebrate the one year anniversary by getting back on my feet and returning to some sort of semblance of normality. I won't even look at job listings until then."

There was a pause.

"That's still awfully soon," Mrs. Evans muttered unhappily, but when she didn't immediately present a counter offer, Dania took that as a good sign.

"I'll even cut down my daily walks in half, and dedicate that time toward resting in the house," she added, sweetening the deal.

It took a few more nudges, and several carefully placed encouragement, but by the end of the day Mrs. Evans agreed.

"Suddenly I understand where you get your stubbornness streak, Petunia."

Among the constant stream of religious, pseudo-science, actual science, sci-fi and fantasy books that she usually checked out from the library, Dania decided to mix in an introduction to Economics textbook one day.

None of them had anything in them that Dania didn't already know. She didn't know much about the London Stock exchange, that was true, but it couldn't be all too different from its American counterpart or even Nasdaq Copenhagen. Just in case, however she did make sure to pick up a book specifically on that topic. Otherwise, Dania was pretty confident in her knowledge in those areas. Her major in University was Economics after all.

No, the books served another purpose. They were meant to be a cover. An explanation.

Dania left the library carrying four books stacked on top of each other in her arms. Her heels clicked with each purposeful step she took down the front stairs of the building, and her yellow floral patterned dress flared at the knees as she turned the corner. She walked a few blocks, crossed the road, and then arrived at a grocery store parking lot after a few more minutes of strolling through downtown Cokeworth.

This was the arrangement Dania had with Mr. Evans. He would drop her off at the town library at least once a week. Sometimes in the mornings on his way to work if Dania planned to spend a whole day browsing and researching there, and sometimes when he went out to shop for groceries if Dania already knew what she wanted to check out from the library thus only needed half an hour or less to run her errands.

Today was one of those shorter days. She got to the library, returned the books she brought with her, picked out two books related to her body-sharing research that were on her list, chose one novel for her own personal pleasure, and one economics book.

Then by the time Dania had finished her business in the library and made her way to the grocery store, Mr. Evans would usually be waiting in the car for her having finished his shopping, or just getting out of the store with a full cart of goods.

Dania squinted into the blinding sunlight as she scanned the lines of cars, looking for a familiar grey Ford Cortina. The moment her eyes locked onto the Evans family car and noticed a figure milling around it, Dania's face broke out into a triumphant grin.

"I got everything I needed for today." Dania said, announcing her presence as she approached the car.

Mr. Evans, who had been busy getting the trunk open, paused in his work. He shaded his eyes with his hand against the beaming summer sun as he looked up at her "Did you pick up more books on your quest to convert to Buddhism or have you moved to other horizons?"

Dania hummed and maneuvered herself to open the door to the back seat of the car while her arms were full. "I'm not looking to convert, I'm researching."

"Researching what?"

"Souls, the afterlife, and near death experiences just to name a few."

Mr. Evans shot her a look, "I can't tell if I should be concerned about that or not."

"Don't be," Dania was quick to reassure him, "It's a passing interest. Besides, that's not the only thing I got this time, I checked out a book on the basics of micro and macro economics." she said as she unlocked the door and used her foot to swing it open wide enough so that she could plop the books down on the seat.

"I thought you swore off anything to do with math when you finished school." Mr. Evans said casually as he returned to his previous task. He wrapped his hand around two plastic grocery bags in the shopping cart and lifted them out and placed them in the truck. Then turned back to repeat the motion.

"Yeah, but I'm trying something new. I want to invest in the stock market. " Dania said with a causal shrug.

She had done her research, looked through old report cards, and dug up old school assignments that the Evans family kept in the attic in a box with the label 'Petunia: School'. She knew that STEM subjects had never been Petunia's academic strong suits, except for biology. Petunia had always leaned more towards music, oddly enough. That was fine for Petunia if that was what she liked, but it was highly inconvenient for a body-swapper like Dania who couldn't even play a ukulele, one of the simplest instruments to learn, even if her life depended on it.

Dania could get away with her lack of musical talent by just airing her disinterest in playing the piano, and most people simply left it at that. No one wanted to pressure her into returning to a hobby she didn't want to after she had been through such a traumatic experience. Add in a few well placed deflections and misdirections here and there, and it was enough to keep people from looking too deep into the drastic shift in her interests.

The real problem wasn't Dania's lack of knowledge in subjects that Petunia specialized in, it was Petunia's track record of struggling with disciplines that Dania thrived in that became an issue.

Because if she were to suddenly take out a book on econometrics, for example, with absolutely no prior demonstrated skill in basic economics or math, people were going to ask questions. Questions that Dania absolutely did not want to answer. That was why she needed to start small with simple, easy to understand introductory books.

Dania had no credentials, no history in math and most sciences, or even the internet to explain away her knowledge in this world. As she masqueraded as Petunia, she had to establish a new rapport, build up a new story, figure out a way to let her old life bleed into her new one.

"That is definitely something," Mr. Evans said slowly, breaking through Dania's drifting thoughts. He hefted up another grocery bag out of the shopping cart, "But a word of advice from an old fossil like me? Don't trust the stock market. The best financial decision you can make is to hold on to every penny that comes your way."

Dania tilted her head to the side and scrunched her eyebrows together, "If I left all of my money in a savings account, inflation is going to eat it all up. It's much better to invest, and grow my net worth through compound interest. I don't even need to read my book to know that," She said, vaguely gesturing at her pile of books in the car.

Mr. Evans picked up another bag. "That was my parent's approach to finance and that's my approach as well. Not to sound like a grouchy old man, but you kids truly don't know how good you have it. Your future is brighter than a camera flash."

Sometimes it was easy to forget that in this time-warped alternate universe, the middle-aged folks around her were not Baby Boomers. Mr. Evans celebrated his 49th birthday in June. If it was 1978 now, then Mr. Evans would have been born in 1929.

The Silent Generation. Born in the midst of the Great Depression that had swept the globe, then when they grew up, they were thrown into one of the bloodiest wars in human history.

If Mr. Evans had been around in Dania's time, he would either be dead, in a hospital, or in a nursing home. Yet here he was in front of her, with only a slight dusting of salt and pepper grey in his otherwise dark hair.

"What was it like?" Dania suddenly blurted out as her distracting thoughts whirled around her.

Mr. Evans gave her an odd look. "What do you mean?"

"I mean…" Dania trailed off, "Everything. What was everything in your life like?" she asked vaguely. But she didn't know where else to start. What did she know of Mr. Evans?

Where was his childhood home? What was it like growing up in the Depression? He would have been a teenager during the second World War, so what happened to him then? Was he ever caught in a bombing? What about his family? Where were they then? Where were they now?

What were Mr. and Mrs. Evans's backstories?

So many questions. Mr. Evans pressed his lips into a thin line, then smiled.

"Help me finish loading the car," He said jovially as if Dania hadn't said anything at all. But she could see the faint tremble in his wrist as he held out a bag for her to take. "but leave the heavier bags to me. If your mother found out I had you doing the heavy lifting, she would skewer me with a spatula."

Dania stared at the bag, then tentatively accepted it along with Mr. Evans's unspoken plea to drop the subject. She wasn't going to push. Not right now. Perhaps another time.

Then she cast a sideways glance at her books.

"I'm still going to invest." Dania stated.

"Listen Petunia. It may have only occurred to me today, but the fact that you are a Baby Boomer explains a lot."

There was a suspicious package waiting on the coffee table when Dania got back from the supermarket. She tossed her house keys onto a side table, hung up her purse, and put down her book stack on the kitchen table so she could sort them out later.

Dania spared the box a sideways glance as she passed through the living room again.

The box looked inconspicuous enough, wrapped in a thick beige paper and held together by twine. But what caused alarm bells to start ringing in Dania's head was the sticky-note sized piece of parchment attached to the top of the package.

It was most likely from Lily. The first piece of mail that she'd sent since declaring that she wasn't going to come home after graduating from Hogwarts.

"We're home, darling!" Mr. Evans called out as he lugged four grocery bags, carrying two in each hand, through the front door.

Dania glanced over at Mr. Evans, caught his eye, and then jutted her chin at the parcel. "Was this here before we left?" she asked.

Mr. Evans paused and looked over at the package, "No," he said as a small, hopeful smile bloomed across his face, "Lily sent us something?"

"Unfortunately, she did not." Mrs. Evans's voice cut through the air like a knife as she walked down the stairs with a severe air about her, "It's from Potter. He sent it to Tuni."

Suddenly Mr. Evans's entire demeanor changed as he regarded the package with a distant and cold look, and Dania reared her head back in surprise.

"I'm sorry, what? He sent a package to me?" she asked. Mrs. Evans nodded her head in affirmative with a disapproving tut rolling off of her tongue.

Why would James Potter send her a package? Dania spoke with him twice, maybe three times if you counted the farewell at the end of his visit, and she didn't really think she made much of an impression on him from what she could remember. To be fair she really couldn't remember much other than Petunia's dramatic return.

But even then, James Potter acted rather coolly towards Dania before he left. Any conversation she tried to engage him in involved a volatile mixture of jabs and digs so subtle Dania wasn't always sure if he was trying to insult her or not.

So why would he send her a package after nearly seven months of radio silence?

Dania stared down at the parcel for a moment before slipping her sunglasses out of her shirt pocket and put them on. She spun on her heels and disappeared into the kitchen, only to emerge a few moments later with a pair of oven mitts on her hands, a towel tied around the lower half of her face, and a garbage bag under her arm.

Mr. and Mrs. Evans watched with growing amusement as Dania maneuvered around the parcel as if it were an unstable explosive device. With a few careful nudges, she pushed the package down into the bag, tied it close, and carried it an arms length away from her right out the front door. Once outside, Dania kicked off the top of the trash bin Mrs. Evans had left out for collection, and dunked the package like a basketball.

Dania wasn't stupid. She wasn't going to accept any unexpected and unmarked 'gifts' from James freaking Potter, an original Marauder of Hogwarts. Quite frankly, Dania didn't have the time or the energy to entertain the teenager's pranking habits, and she just wasn't going to take the risk.

If the package contained some sort of magical practical joke, then Dania was glad to be rid of it. If it had been a genuine attempt at contact, then he could just send a letter or something that looked lot less sketchy.

So without feeling much guilt, Dania turned back to the house and gave Mr. and Mrs. Evans a wave when she spotted them.

Mrs. Evans beamed from the open door, "That's our daughter."

Author's Note:

Hey everyone, this chapter is unbelievably late but it's honestly been an unbelievable couple of months. I've been working on this chapter on and off since January and life just kept on getting in the way, especially this last month. I hope you are all safe, at home, and remembering to social distance yourself from others. This is all just so insane -.-

But in happier news, this fic is now officially over 30,000 words long and we have reached the halfway point! All of the major plot points that needed to be set up have been set up, and things are going to get quite exciting from here. It's also been a year since I started this fic too so yay!

Stay safe everyone, and I'll see you next time!

~Lost-In-The-Muse