The Dark Spaces Between
In a small house on Privet Drive, there is a boy, who does not believe in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth fairy or Sandman. Nor indeed, has he ever heard their names. In a home where magic is a forbidden word, how could a child learn of beings of magic?
In a small house on Privet Drive, there is a boy whose wonder and hope was never given a chance to flourish. Instead it was trampled by harsh words and harsher hands. There is a boy whose happy memories early in life are so obscured by the constant torrent of pain and hatred, that they are all but forgotten. In a cupboard under the stairs, there is a boy to whom pleasant dreams are painful, for they are in stark contrast to his life. He bears the knowledge that dreams, no matter how good, are temporary and never come true - and sometimes it is better never to dream at all.
In a small house on Privet Drive, there is a lost soul - pain, longing, and resignation ravaging at the innocence in the heart of a child.
The Guardians do not know this. They do not know about the child that needs their protection. How could they? How would they feel the pain of the loss of a believer, when the belief was never there?
Can you loose something you never had?
After all, the Guardians have so many believers, and they must focus on those who believe. They do not see what isn't there. When they gaze at their Globe, they sigh in happiness at each pinprick of light, never really looking at the darkness in the spaces between. The shadows where wonder, hope and happiness have faded. They assume that there a simply no children there, and consider it no further. They do not see.
So every Christmas, North and his sleigh fly past Privet Drive without stopping. Each Easter, no eggs are left in the yard behind Number 4 for a child to find. Each lost tooth is thrown in the trash and forgotten so no coin is delivered. Every night that he sleeps, no dream sand comes to comfort him with dreams of love and comfort and safety.
The Guardians will never know that they failed. They will never know that they failed to protect this child; the child who would later be willing to sacrifice everything for the sake of others.
The child who would become a Guardian all on his own; by his choice to die so that others wouldn't have to.
Is ignorance really bliss?