She walked down the hallway, lit dimly by the softest of torches, throwing frightening shadows on the stone walls. The only sounds were the dainty clicks of her heels, the swish of her robes around her ankles and her heavy breathing, which softly blew a strand of curly dark hair, falling on her face. The nearby torch reflected a gleam off her prefect badge, like a flash, but she carried on. Upon reaching the heavy door, which was always thrown open, she walked in, strutting past the shelves, till she reached the least popular alcove. It was akin to a niche, where she sat herself, took the barely read book and drowned herself.
Being the paradox she was, Bellatrix Alameda Black lost herself in the Muggle world of tragic literature.
She'd move her cherry stained lips with the words written centuries before (by a Muggle, no less!) reading aloud the tales of horror, betrayal, love and fairy tale endings. Poetry, prose, ballads and plays. Sagas of royal families, with ambitious heirs who'd die in war. Ballads of lovers, cruelly torn apart and forced to die in remembrance of one another. So much drama, she thought, so much passion and I can only hope to be a part of such a tale.
She wanted it so bad, so, so bad. She'd create worlds of her own.
In the darkness of the night, while her friends lounged on the cold leather couches, bathed in the green glow of the common room, she would sit in the little alcove and dream and dream….
She's a minstrel, with a puffy red, tattered skirt and long, thick hair which shone under the lantern. She's dancing in the middle and the room smells of chamomile and expensive brandy and the sizzling oil on the quail breast. She's spinning to the music, flowing with it and she can feel all eyes on her. The young son of the house, will get up from the table and praise her, maybe even throw a gift to her, while secretly his eyes would twinkle, signaling her to meet at the back of the horse stable. They'd kiss each other and promise to be together, because everything always wins in the end if it has love and, and she'd breathe in his scent until those cruel, cruel guards would spot them and tell the master of the house who would drag his son away and banish the minstrel until she, in despair would hang herself on the Hanging Tree at the edge of town…
Oh, she could dream. In the day, at night, in consciousness and without it. A rampant imagination took life in her head, where she was a tragedy, a sad, sad saga so bittersweet it would burn itself into hearts and minds.
It's what she wanted to be. A tragedy. A legend. Her name written in history, and she'd be that girl.
But she was nothing. She was just Bellatrix Black who hated her middle name, and her first name. She was just the rich Black girl, who would get the good grades and make Slytherin proud and the one with the pretty younger sister. She was just little Bella.
Nothing.
When she is at home for the holidays, during the night she will lie in bed, in the soft sheets and let her Cissy comb her hair, pretending it's really just a chambermaid and she'll pretend that the laughter of Siri from downstairs is a drunken servant and her Andie will read her dark poems of death and longing and unrequited love.
Oh, she imagines and acts and hopes.
On Christmas night, they're all huddled up in comforters, five of them. Little Regulus' eyes are drooping, as he lays in Andy's lap, who is pulling her Slytherin muffler closer together. Cissy sits beside her, sipping eggnog and Siri is rocking back and forth, filled with excitement and Cissy will whisper and ask her to make a Christmas wish and the only thing she will do is close her eyes and pray to Merlin:
All I want is to be a tragedy. I don't want all this love and money and happiness. Please, make me a tragedy. Make me a tragedy. I want to be a cataclysm, a catastrophe. Make me a sad heroine of a sad story.
Then she laughs at a joke Siri cracks.
But her wish never comes true and she ignores the way the wind whispers in her ear that, Bella, you are a tragedy if you are hoping to be one, people are what they pretend to be and she ignores it because how can she be a tragedy if she wants to be a tragedy and –
Deep breath and she walks on, deaf.
She watches as Mummy takes her wand and burns down Andy's name and yanks Bella aside and whispers, like the wind, that, Bella, you have only one sister now and her name is Narcissa and she watches as Mummy takes Andy by the arm and throws her out and she runs to her mudblood lover and, and it's unfair because now Andy is a tragedy and not her…
It's not fair.
She watches as Auntie Walburga takes her wand and burns down Siri's name and yanks Bella aside and screams, not like the wind which whispers, and says that Bella, you have only one cousin now and his name is Regulus and she watches as Siri spits her goodbye and revs the motorbike and flies away and, and it's unfair because now Siri is a tragedy and not her…
It's not fair.
She watches the little toddler, a muggle boy as she points her wand at him and he tugs at her skirt and cries, not like the wind, and says Miss, please don't hurt me, please don't kill me, please let me go, please and she watches as the green flash leaves the tip of her wand and he thuds to the floor, sprayed with his waste and tears and, and it's unfair because now even the muggle boy is a tragedy and not her…
It's not fair.
It's never fair.
She's just trapped Bella where nobody cares. When will she be the tragedy?
You are a tragedy.
She tells the wind to shut up.
The girl's screams scratch her ears and she can hear the young boy downstairs screaming and shouting the girl's name as a deranged lover and she seethes in anger because now even this pathetic seventeen year old child is a tragedy and it's not fair and she can only take revenge for that and she screams, not like the wind, like Auntie Walburga, like how she killed Siri in revenge and how she tried to kill Dora in revenge and she takes revenge and screams Crucio, Crucio, Crucio and enjoys the screams of the tragic child who lies on the floor.
And then the woman's red hair is flying everywhere and she is screaming, not like the wind, at her and throwing curses and suddenly, suddenly there is a whisper in her head, like the wind and it says, Bella, oh Bella, you know not how to love or cherish but only to destroy and hurt and rip and tear and kill. I feel sorry for you, you are a tragedy.
And she can only laugh and laugh and laugh as the spell hits her and ends her tragic, tragic life.