Disclaimer: I'm just a guest in Jo's pretty world
They told Andromeda not to wonder, that things were as they were. That it was just the way things are meant to be. She never believed them.
She rebelled against the tyranny of the Pureblood Society, with all its confines and prejudices. She shunned their narrow view of the world. She did not believe that things were meant to be a certain way.
Instead, Andromeda had wondered.
Wondered at the beauty of the sunset outside the bay window of her first house with Ted. Wondered at the ease with which the Order of the Phoenix conversed, an ease never heard of in the Pureblood Society. Wondered at how Nymphadora's hair could go from lime green to vermillion in less than a second.
Now, she wonders why her husband has died and yet she lives.
God, the bed is cold without him. Andromeda shivers beneath her sheets, her body unaccustomed to so much room on the bed. She sobs, hugging her knees to her chest in the fetal position, because it is so unfair.
She wants to throw her hands up in the air and scream, but her Black family roots keep her nailed to her calm, ladylike exterior. She does not carry on. She does not reveal the tempest of grief inside her. She cannot.
It's for Nymphadora, she tells herself. Be strong for your daughter. Support her and the baby. Take care of them.
But every night in that godforsaken, half-vacant bed is like salt in an open wound. And Andromeda prays for morning, where she can busy herself with breakfast and preparations for the baby. Forget about him, for just a moment.
That is the way things are meant to be. We lose loved ones, and soon their graves are covered with the sands of time. Their memories live as long as we do.
It is not enough for Andromeda. Half of the bed is empty, half of her heart is empty too. She wonders why.
At nightfall, she returns to the dreaded bed. She slips beneath the covers, her dark hair falling in gentle curls across the pillow. She does not turn out the lights, because that is the way things are meant to be. And Andromeda does not want things to be the way they are meant to be. She wants Ted back.
She falls asleep, looking through the photo album of her wedding. All the happy pictures, the happy smiles. Remembering the happenings of that beautiful fall day ('Ted, I swear, if you don't stop touching my hair it's going to lose all its curl...!')
In the morning, her daughter finds her propped up in bed, light on, asleep hunched over a worn photo album. She leaves her mother there.
The baby is born a few months later, on time and healthy, the way things are meant to be. Andromeda wonders at how his hair can go from lemon yellow to ultramarine in less than a second. She wonders why Nymphadora must go into battle, why can't she stay in the safety of her mother's home.
And it is only at her child's funeral that Andromeda stops wondering.
She holds her screaming grandson as they lower the casket into the ground. Nymphadora goes into the plot beside her father. How Andromeda envies Ted now, for somehow keeping the natural order of life. For going before Nymphadora did.
Parents are not meant to bury their children.
She realizes now that in some beautiful, terrible aspect, they were all right in the end. They told Andromeda not to wonder, that things were as they were. That it was just the way things are meant to be. She never believed them.
But as she throws the first handful of dirt, she knows why Ted had to go.
So that he did not have to endure this. So that he never had to see his beautiful, pink-haired baby in a casket. Parents should die first, always. Andromeda knows this now.
It is the way things are meant to be.