The Power to Forget
AlwaysPadfoot
AN: Walburga Black was my given character. I thought this was going to be really hard but weirdly enough it came quite easy.
Seven Years
September 1936
"Growing up is losing some illusions, in order to acquire others."
Dear Diary,
I love the way he looks at me, the way we can talk forever and I'm so glad that we were able to work together in Potions. I might be a Slytherin and he a Ravenclaw, but I can't help but like him. There's only one problem, Joshua is of disputed blood and background.
He grew up in a Muggle Orphanage and most Purebloods were happy to just call him a Mudblood, but I don't think he is. He's only a first year, and he's smart and amazing with magic so he can't be a Muggleborn, he can't. I like being his friend, I love working together in classes and outside and I really wanted to spend more time with him.
My Dad would be mad though, in fact, I'd probably be disowned if he found out that I was friends with Joshua. He's happy to keep it a secret and I'm glad, but that can't go on forever.
In other news I'm really enjoying Hogwarts, there's only one other girl in my year, but my Mum told me that lots of families don't sent their daughters to Hogwarts. Her cousins didn't go to Hogwarts and the only reason she did was because she was an only child and her parents had to send someone to carry their family name and to connect with other families. My Mum was lucky and I considered myself lucky too.
The Blacks send all of their daughters to Hogwarts, but mainly so they could show off that they have lots of money thus encouraging people to form ties with the family.
All the Blacks are Slytherins too. Could you imagine not being one?
Ravenclaws are okay of course, but Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors? That would be awful. Thank gosh the hat only considered me for Slytherin.
Maybe Joshua and I can find his actual family and maybe they will be magical, even if he were a HalfBlood that would be okay, right? Since I was marrying outside of the Black family... as long as my Dad didn't marry me off. That would require making people like me, and I wasn't good at that.
Anyway, I'm going to meet Joshua in the library to do some Transfiguration.
Walburga
Seven Months
May 1942
"Reality continues to ruin my life."
Dear Diary,
No. No. This cannot be happening. My life is over right now.
Today, my mother and father informed me that to keep the family as pure as possible I would be marrying my cousin, Orion. Of course, it's not unusual for Purebloods to marry cousins, but Orion is my second cousin. We grew up together, we have the same last name.
Cygnus tells me it was because I spent all my time associating with Joshua that no one had wanted to marry me and therefore forcing Dad to marry in the family.
Joshua wanted to marry me.
The wedding is at Christmas and who knows, it's the holidays of my seventh year, I might not be coming back.
How am I going to tell him that I'm engaged? I doubt he was going to just run his fingers through my hair and tell me it was going to be okay, because it wasn't okay. Joshua and I will never be together, we wouldn't even be able to be friends let alone be as close as we were. Orion would not allow it, my family wouldn't either so basically our relationship was about to crumble from underneath. Perhaps with a lot more emphasis on my side.
Why was I stupid enough to get myself mixed up with Joshua?
My father was going to be furious that we were still friends when I got back from the Summer holidays. In fact, my mother would be even more furious. She'd say that I wasted my time on him, disgraced the chance that she and my father had given me by letting me attend Hogwarts, and then to associate with people like Joshua would be like throwing their supposed good nature back in their faces.
Suddenly, facing my mother has become a horrific prospect.
I come from a dark family. I believe in blood purity. I believe magic is sacred. So why did I get myself into this mess in the first place? Why didn't I just do what I was supposed to?
Walburga
Seven Weeks
October 1942
"Not the power to remember, but its very opposite, the power to forget, is a necessary condition for our existence."
Dear Diary,
That Mudblood tried to convince me we were friends again today. I don't even know his name yet still he persists to bother me everytime he sees me. He even sits next to me in class, I ignore him of course, but it is rather ludicrous that he thinks we have been friends since first year.
I mean honestly, I'm a Slytherin and he is a Ravenclaw, and on top of that the Mudblood is of disputed blood and background. he grew up in a filthy muggle orphanage. I would never associate with someone that beneath me.
Never.
Orion, my fiancé, keeps telling me to ignore him, and I'm trying but the Mudblood is really getting on my last nerve.
You think he'd get the hint.
We're not friends. We never were. I'm getting married in seven weeks; I can't associate with other men, particularly those of no status whatsoever.
Unfortunately, its like he knows where I'm going all the time. I hid myself away in the library to get some work done and he found me there. I tried doing some extra practice on some spells in an empty classroom on the fifth floor and he found me. I don't know why its so important for him to stalk me around the castle. He knows my routines and movements like he's been watching me for the past six years at Hogwarts.
So for now, I'm just going to spend my spare time in the Slytherin Common Room until he gets the hint.
Walburga
Seven Days
December 1942
"There are edges around the black and every now and then a flash of color streaks out of the gray. But I can never really grasp any of the slivers of memories that emerge."
Dear Diary,
The house is chaotic. All the family is staying at the manor house at the moment and when the guests arrive our house will be full to the brim. Every room will be occupied and over one-hundred people will be eating breakfast each morning.
When I'm not needed for dress fitting or various other activities for the wedding, I try to keep out the way because all the noise and madness is giving me frequent migraines. Sometimes Orion will join me and I'll listen to him talk about a million things without interjecting. He likes it when I listen, and honestly I don't feel like I have very much to talk about so listening suits me fine. When I'm alone, I'll sit in the bay window and look out across the grounds. If its warm I'll sit on the balcony.
I like how calming being alone is and in the days running up until the wedding, it allows me to feel strangely at ease. All the other moments, the family running around, the house elves frantically cleaning every corner made me feel a little sick.
In the drawer of my room there's a stack of letters all addressed in the same neat cursive. I've had one delivered every day since I left Hogwarts for Christmas. I know who they're from and I have a rough idea of what they say, but I daren't open them because I'm almost terrified of what I will read.
I was tempted to tell Orion that the Mudblood was still bothering me and give them all to him, but annoyingly something stopped me.
Eventually I just decided to stash them away with a notice-me-not charm on it so that Orion didn't see them. It also allows me to ignore them too. My logic keeps telling me to get rid of them but if someone finds them in the bin.
I'm trying to stop thinking about it, but sometimes I just want to get rid of them before the wedding.
It'll be fine.
He'll get the hint once I'm married and he'll go away.
Walburga
Seven Minutes
December 1942
"No matter how much suffering you went through, you never wanted to let go of those memories."
Dear Diary,
In seven minutes my father will be collecting me from this very room and walking me down the aisle.
Not long ago, a small familiar barn owl soared through my window and dropped a small package on my bed. As soon as I recognised the writing I was ready to ignore it, but I was drawn to it. When I opened the parcel, a small shiny object fell out onto the sheets of my bed accompanied by a letter, which I'm going to stick in here right away.
Walburga,
This was the ring I was planning on proposing with all those months ago. It's jewel has similar properties to a pensive as its main trait is to allow the wearer to access all the memories held inside.
This ring is my last hope.
I hope it shows you what you seem to have forgotten, because I know something happened to you in the Summer and I know you wouldn't act the way you have been doing.
Sorry about the compulsion charm, but I needed you to open this.
Love Joshua
Yes, I put the ring on. How can I get married to Orion after getting all these memories back? Suddenly the Mudblo - Joshua and I have this whole past and it is amazing, so what the hell happened? What happened in the summer that made me forget all of this?
This is too much.
I can kind of remember something, but it wasn't good. No, it was bad, really bad. My parents did something…. I need my old diaries.
Oh god, I've just pulled them all out and it's all here.
September 1936 - I love the way he looks at me…
December 1936 - I stayed at Hogwarts for Christmas with Joshua because he hates where he lives.
October 1937 - Joshua surprised me on my birthday, he found the kitchens and he got the elves to make me a vanilla sponge.
May 1939 - It's the last Hogsmeade trip today and Joshua…
Over and over again, almost every single entry had Joshua in. Here was this whole life that had been subconsciously repressed and it suddenly was changing everything. I couldn't, I wouldn't marry Orion, not now, at least not yet. Not until I'd figured this all out.
I cannot forget this again.
Oh gosh my Dad is going to be here any min -
Seven Seconds
December 1942
"It's better to burn out than to fade away."
I was walking up the aisle, my father latched onto my arm, his nails digging into the flesh on my left forearm, although no one could see that.
When he'd found me with those diaries, and the letter, and the ring, I'd never seen him so furious. I'm scared that whatever happened before was going to happen again and I'd never see Joshua again. I'd never know what happened. I had to bite the inside of my cheek to stop from crying. I couldn't even lift my head to look at my family because it was too hard not to think: what do they really know?
As we came to a halt next to Orion, my father met my eyes with a warning look etched to his features and reluctantly passed my hand to my future husbands. I stood as stiff as a board as all the guests quietened down and waited for the minister to speak. Now I was trapped, and it was all because of my stupid stubbornness. I should have just read the letters.
"Ladies and Gentleman, welcome to the Wedding of Miss Walburga Black and Master Orion Black."
I'm not going to just fade out and go along with this. I can't, not just because of Joshua, but for my own sake as well. There was something that my family did that I needed to know. I shifted uncomfortably, causing Orion to shoot a wary glance at me. Discretion was clearly not working for me right now. My mind was so busy going over the possible consequences of any action I made right now that I wasn't really listening to the vows that the Minister was reading aloud until finally the room fell silent.
Oh god they were waiting for me.
"Walburga?" Orion hissed under his breath.
I turned to stare at him before a hint of a smirk crossed my face for a second, "No."
The rest of the wedding was a blur of madness, I tried to run and I remember almost making it. There was lots of screaming and yelling and I honestly thought that maybe I could fix this. Then it finished, the wedding ended in a spiral of darkness and I went out with a bang.
Seven Notes
"Life goes on."
i. January 1943
Joshua Collins did not return to Hogwarts to finish his final year. Never hearing from Walburga after sending the ring broke his heart.
ii. July 1943
Walburga and Orion Black were married on a warm day. Everyone understood that what happened the previous December was the product of Walburga suffering from the worse case of Wizarding Flu recorded for years.
iii. December 1944
After numerous tries to get into contact with Walburga, Joshua finally spotted her in Diagon Alley but she didn't recognise him. She snarled at him and refused to listen to a word he said on the grounds of him being a Mudblood.
iv. February 1945
On the first day of the month Joshua Collins was found dead on the floor of his London apartment. It was assumed that he killed himself. Nobody knew why.
v. August 1947
Walburga was clearing out her Grandfather's room in Black manor when she found a Diamond ring locked away in one of the draws. Suffice to say she spend the whole night crying after discovering that Joshua Collins had killed himself two and half years before.
vi. September 1947
Upon discovering hundreds of letters from Joshua, Walburga Black realised she was the cause of his death and she never got over it. It drove her mad.
vii. February 1985
On the first of February 1985, exactly forty years after the suicide of Joshua Collins, Walburga Black died in her home in Grimmauld Place.
"We cannot tear out a single page of our life, but we can throw the whole book in the fire."