There on the sofa sat his mother:
Iris Ollivander.
She was reading a book, barefoot, with a knitted blanket draped over her legs. Her golden-blonde hair fell in messy waves across her shoulders. She had gray eyes like ancient steel, the same precise, luminous gaze as Garrick, though without his hardness. In her, gray eyes meant gentleness, patience, and reassurance.
She was about thirty-eight, still young, with a serene and timeless beauty that required neither makeup nor jewelry. Her perfect nose, her refined features… all of that, Ryan had inherited as well.
In fact, it was like looking into an inverted mirror.
The same skin tone, the same eyes, the same golden-blonde hair—though Ryan wore his short—the same facial structure… only that he was her masculine reflection. If someone saw them together for the first time, they would never doubt their relation.
And that was exactly what unsettled him.
'Is this… my mother?' he thought, feeling his heart pound harder, as if something deep and unexpected had struck him inside.
He said nothing. He couldn't. He just looked at her.
In his past life, he had been an orphan, yet he had the same appearance as the current Ryan. Which meant his original mother might have looked exactly like Iris here. Was this the multiverse? Infinite variations of the same face with different stories? And what if his original mother had resembled her?
She looked up. Met his gaze. "And where are you going with that mischievous face, young man?" Iris asked in a soft, teasing voice, with that tone that blends tenderness with maternal warning.
Ryan stepped closer almost without thinking, as though guided by something more than memory.
His steps came out clumsy, robotic. The lump in his throat was real.
He had a mother. The dream of every orphan.
"Hi… mom," he murmured.
It was barely a whisper. But that word, so simple, so ordinary to others, was an entire universe to him.
He had spoken it once before. Just once. By accident, to his elementary teacher. The shame that followed had lasted for days. He even fought three bullies to defend his honor.
He won, but he was punished as well, a fair price.
Now, however, it wasn't a mistake. This was his mother.
Iris narrowed her eyes, sniffing the air like a witch who senses a prank before it detonates.
"What are you plotting now?" she said with mock seriousness. "I know that face of yours. That's your I'm-about-to-do-something-recklessly-brilliant-and-it'll-work-out-by-luck face."
Ryan smirked, "I don't plan on bothering the neighbors. Today."
"Hmmm…" Iris set the book aside and stretched a little, the blanket still over her legs.
"Just remember to think twice before the neighbor's chimney starts spitting frogs again. And by the way," she added with that sharp tone she used whenever it was time to enforce household justice, "I remind you that today it's your turn to clean the kitchen. Or are you planning to leave it to the invisible house-elves?"
Ryan chuckled softly.
His mother didn't like house-elves. She had never kept any. She always said she'd rather clean herself than have a slave living in her home.
A rare outlook among wizards… and one of the things that made him respect her the most. Both the first Ryan and now him.
Perhaps that was why the former Ryan had been so rebellious and anti-establishment.
"I will… but first," Ryan said, sitting down beside her on the sofa.
Iris raised a brow. "First? That sounds suspicious."
Ryan reached into his pocket and pulled out the five galleons the system had rejected just minutes earlier. He placed them in his mother's palm without a word. Iris took them, examining them with a mix of confusion and amusement.
"Are you… giving me money?" she asked.
Ryan didn't answer right away. He pulled out the black magical quill he carried with him, spinning it between his fingers with solemnity, as though it were some ancestral wand.
"Mom…" he began, adopting the tone of a street vendor with theatrical training, "this is no ordinary quill. This is the quill. My loyal companion since third year at Hogwarts. With it, I wrote important assignments, the essay that saved me in Charms, and even the infamous poem I wrote to get my first girlfriend."
Iris brought a hand to her mouth, trying to hold back her laughter. "Oh yes… Susan, the Ravenclaw girl," she said with sparkling eyes. "Remind me again why you broke up with her?"
Ryan sighed with a mix of resignation and humor. "She was… intense."
"How intense?" Iris asked.
Of course, Iris already knew the story. Ryan had written to her in outrage back at Hogwarts, wasting half an inkwell dramatizing it. But she wanted to hear it again, straight from his mouth.
"She used to write me letters every single day. She would show up at the library just to stare at me in silence. And she had a hand-drawn map of every place in Hogwarts where we had ever had a conversation."
"Whoa… admirable devotion," Iris commented, nodding like an anthropologist who had just discovered an exotic tribe.
"And she didn't like it when I napped during my free time. She wanted us to use it to grow together emotionally."
"A very committed young lady," Iris said, amused. "So, at what point did you decide it was too much?"
"When my naps became less and less frequent," Ryan replied with a somber expression and a funereal tone.
Iris's laughter was soft and warm. "Ah yes… of course. How dare she interfere with the sacred ritual of Ryan Ollivander's rest!" she teased, ruffling his hair affectionately.
Ryan looked at her with a genuine smile, not avoiding the maternal gesture. In fact, he remained still, as if wanting to soak in that moment.
"Exactly! One day I woke up from my nap under the tree with her sitting right next to me, watching me sleep… smiling! I'm not ready for that kind of energy."
Iris glanced at him sideways, still smiling. She had the five galleons in one hand and the old quill in the other. She examined it with tenderness, running her fingers over the cracked handle. Her expression shifted slightly, from laughter to sincere affection.
"And what mother in her right mind wouldn't want to keep an object so filled with history?" she murmured, almost to herself.
She extended the galleons and let them fall gently into her son's palm. "Transaction accepted, young merchant. I don't need a receipt."
Ryan took them with mock pride, as if he had just closed a million-galleon deal. He stood up theatrically and slipped the coins into his pocket as though they were ancient relics. "It has been a pleasure doing business, Madame Ollivander."
Then, with a casual air, though clearly rehearsed, Iris poked him with a remark that mixed teasing with genuine wishfulness:
"And when are you going to bring me a proper girlfriend home during the holidays? Because so far, there have only been two… and let's be honest: you could make better use of that face you inherited from me."
Ryan snorted in amusement. "Wow, such humility."
"Don't tell me it's not true. Look at me," Iris shot back, raising an eyebrow and gesturing to her own face with both hands as if it were a masterpiece.
Ryan looked her up and down with mock skepticism. "Yeah, sure… Although now that I think about it… after Dad, you never had another partner." He paused dramatically, folding his arms. "Maybe I inherited the same character from you, and that's why it's hard for me to get a proper girlfriend. Instead of worrying about my love life, shouldn't you be worrying about yours?"
The silence that followed was immediate and dangerous. Iris narrowed her eyes.
Ryan swallowed hard.
"What did you say, darling?" she asked in a voice as soft as it was deadly. A faint electric tingle lingered in the air.
"It was a joke! A joke!" Ryan blurted, hands raised.
But it was too late.
Iris was already on her feet with unsettling grace, her eyes gleaming with that spark that appears when a powerful witch decides she must reinforce her maternal authority.
"In answer to your question, there's no one worthy. And I'd rather spend my time looking after a son who clearly needs more lessons in respect," she said, twisting her wrist with subtle elegance.
Ryan tried to draw his wand from his pocket, but it was too late.
"Accio wand!" Iris exclaimed.
The wand shot out of his pocket like a traitor and landed obediently in his mother's hand.
"Hey! That's cheating if I can't defend myself," Ryan protested, offended.
"Your fault for being slow," Iris replied with a smile, soft, far too soft. "No permanent damage. Probably."
"That's magical child abuse!" Ryan shouted, stepping back.
"You're fifteen already!" Iris shot back. And with no more warning, she raised the wand.
"Rictusempra!"
The spell hit Ryan square in the chest, and a second later, he was writhing with laughter on the living room floor.
He shook as though a hundred enchanted feathers were tickling his ribs. Laughter burst out of him in explosions, ragged and chaotic.
Iris walked toward him calmly, knelt with elegance, and, as though she hadn't just reduced him to a giggling mess, placed Ryan's head on her lap.
"Shhh, shhh…" she murmured, stroking his hair tenderly while her son wept with laughter, unable to stop.
"Ha, haha, stop, I can't!" he begged between spasms of hysterics, his cheeks red, his eyes glistening with tears.
Iris smiled sweetly, looking at him as though he were five years old again. "Oh? You want me to stop?"
"Yes, please!" he managed to gasp.
"Well…" she said, as if granting some whimsical request, "Finite Incantatem."
The spell dissipated instantly.
Ryan lay sprawled, gasping for breath as though he'd just run a comedy marathon. He looked up, hair a mess, glaring at her with a mix of offense and defeat.
"You're evil," he muttered, not moving, simply staying there, feeling Iris's hand softly running through his hair.
"Yes," Iris replied, raising an eyebrow as if he'd just handed her a compliment.
"And you earned it. You always think you're so clever because professors can't do anything but let your sarcasm slide, because your creative excuses and impeccable logic get you out of trouble, because your classmates think you're the coolest in Gryffindor, and because your girlfriends, well, the few you've had, put up with every sarcastic comment and crooked smile…"
Iris lowered her gaze to him, her gray eyes sparking with a mix of pride and warning.
"But I'm your mother, Ryan. With me, that doesn't work."
Ryan smiled with half-closed eyes. "I was hoping maternal affection would grant me immunity."
"Beginner's mistake," Iris retorted. "And you're no beginner. So don't try it again."
He chuckled, his chest still rising and falling from the remnants of laughter. Sitting up, he offered her a hand.
Iris took it, one eyebrow arched as though expecting an ambush at any moment, but let herself be helped up.
As she stood, she gave him a sly smile that clearly promised nothing good. "Back to your love life… Marlene McKinnon. Now she I liked."
Ryan let out a small snort, looking away as though the ceiling had suddenly become a tapestry of ancient runes. "Are we still talking about this? I thought taking a spell point-blank would spare me from discussing my romantic history with my mother."
"Don't be naive," said Iris, smiling sweetly yet ominously. "That spell only settled your earlier insolent remark."
Ryan rolled his eyes and sighed. In his mind, the memories of the former Ryan offered him answers. Annoying ones, but clear.
"Well… if it makes you happy, yes. I liked Marlene. But she was too intense as well."
"Oh, please!" exclaimed Iris, rolling her eyes. "Smart, brave, funny… pure-blood without prejudice, skilled at spells, lovely smile. And she was too intense too?"
"Yes. Intense," Ryan repeated, though this time with less conviction, as if his defense was running out of strength.
"But not like Susan, the scary stalker," Iris said, crossing her arms. "Marlene's intensity was… invigorating. It was good for you."
"I know," Ryan murmured. Then he shrugged. "But it also became annoying. She started demanding things of me. Asking me to take school more seriously. To focus. To have, real ambitions."
"And that's bad?" Iris asked in a more serious tone.
"When it involves waking up early, yes," Ryan replied with mock seriousness. "I lost many naps because of Marlene McKinnon."
"So according to your logic, you broke up with both your girlfriends because they took away your sacred naps. Fascinating. Your grandfather would weep with pride," Iris snorted.
"Or from exhaustion?" Ryan muttered as he began climbing the stairs to his room.
But before he reached the first step, Iris's voice stopped him.
"Ryan."
He turned slightly.
"Seriously… I'd like to see you have ambitions. Not just survive Hogwarts. Not just date girls and nap under trees. I'd like to see you… build something. Head somewhere."
Ryan stood still for a moment. The former Ryan, brilliant but lazy, had never taken it seriously. But now, he did.
He smiled at his mother. "I will, Mom. In fact," he began, pulling one of the five galleons he had just reclaimed from his pocket, "I'm already working on it."
Iris looked at him with slight surprise. Not at the words… but at the conviction behind them.
Ryan winked at her and continued up the stairs.
"I promise I won't dump the next girlfriend because of naps."
"You'd better not!" Iris shouted from below, smiling with a lighter heart.
...
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