The clock always ran slower on the last day of school. It was a warm June afternoon with the faintest whisper of a breeze weaving its way through the Oak trees in the courtyard. The Salem Witches' Institute resided on the town limits of historic Salem, Massachusetts. Libby sat through Transfigurations, slipping off the tip of her regulation hardwood seat. 3 more minutes, then she could grab her bags and head to the train station that dropped her off in Washington DC, where her parents would pick her up and take her back home to the mansion she called home in Baltimore, Maryland. It was one of her family's many homes scattered along the East Coast, but Baltimore is the only place in the world Libby McMillan could walk in and say to herself, "I'm home."
3 minutes until her 3rd year at Salem was finished. Libby's father owned the McDonald's, KFC, and Bojangle's units all along the East Coast, and in Guam. This led to those awkward conversations when her best friend after explaining her father's occupation as an important scientist in the movement banning fast food, she just told her friend that James McMillan was a bank teller. Now enough about Libby…
This is my diary, the diary I wrote as it was happening, and some commentary looking back on it, "it" will be evident soon enough.
So now class is over, at last, and I am sitting in my dorm. My cousin Ernie sent this Diary to me from England. A lot of kids here at school call me a muggle-born, but my Dad is a squib, I guess the magical gene skips a generation every once and a while. Ernie's Dad is magical too, and Ernie goes to some crazy school called Pigwarts or something outside of London. He tells me all these crazy stories how he knows Harry Potter personally, I will eat my socks if he does know him. Ernie isn't the most popular kid if you know what I mean…
The train in Boston is rented out by the school at every break so we can all talk about magical stuff and not have restraining orders filed against us by the general public. Life is pretty interesting for me and my roommates. There are four of us, two bunkbeds, it's like a group of sad high school clichés all in one room. You have the obsessive right wing political guru who is constantly spouting conspiracy theories, that's Jade from Ohio. Then you have the cheerleader who is constantly fixing her makeup in the bathroom, that's Nina from Florida. Then you have the one who ultra competitive and hasn't made too many wonderful accomplishments, but will none the less blow her none existent accomplishments out of proportion, that's Isabelle from Virginia. Then there is me, people think I am some kind child genius, but I just like to live in the shadows, that's Libby from Maryland. I drag my trunk out from the closet and begin to pack my things. It's almost 5 when I manage to half levitate half drag my trunk to the cart in the 3rd year girls' common room.
The train is something I dread every year, almost as much as picking groups in classes, it's obvious who has no friends, so in each compartment you have each little friend group…
Then the awkwardly silent compartment full of people that have no friends, as you can imagine, that's my compartment. The train ride is cruel, each stop, torture. So you can imagine my relief when I step off the train in downtown DC and see my parents, oh my clueless parents waiting for me, chatting up all the parents.
I quickly make my way over and faster than you can say Bojangle's I was at last in my room, sniffing the odd mixture of coconut and pineapple that my bedroom always seemed to encompass. I was finally settling down to a good read of fanfiction with my laptop when my mother awkwardly waltzed into my room with a fake smile plastered onto her face.
"All right what's up" I asked skeptically "What hamster escaped", I said with heavy air quotes, I still hadn't forgiven her for Mr. Sniffles.
"Your father and I have some things to… discuss with you." My eyes got instinctively wide, my family had already had this talk I was not comfortable with going through that pain again. "Oh no honey it's nothing to worry about, it just seems that all this bad economy has really caught up with our family, and we're going to need to make some changes, major changes."
"What we're trying to say is, my job has become more complicated, and it seems some people don't want me around anymore, I'm afraid we will be relocating our family." Said my father who I had not noticed in the room until that moment.
"Oh, how far are we talking?, I have always wanted to try the Portland location…"
"ENGLAND" My mother shouted, her face was quivering, "England, honey, with Ernie, remember him?" I could tell the great pain this was causing her.
"Oh, England that sounds fun," I attempted to make light of a situation that could not be made light of. They could tell I was taking it well, or at least they fell for my acting telling them that, and left my room. All I could tell myself was that I wasn't leaving anything behind, I didn't have any friends, I hated my school, and I didn't have a real home. In England I would be going to Pigwarts or something with Ernie, have a permanent home, and I could start over with my social life, I could be anyone I wanted to be.
The plane ride to England was cruelly silent, with the occasional, oh look I think that's a whale out the window. Our private jet flew us to London, then took off quickly. I had a feeling we wouldn't be seeing him again.
Ernie was weirder than I remember him… I don't think that's a good thing. He is going to be a 7th year at what I have now been informed is known as "Hogwarts" he said he had talked to his Headmaster and because I was too old to be sorted I would just go into "Hufflepuff" with Ernie. I would be a 4th year next year. I tell this to Ernie and he begins to spout stories about his 4th year at Hogwarts, destiny and death and such, while I tune him out to some good Green Day.
Ernie and I are both an only child so I spend the majority of the summer amusing him with the "stupidity" of the American culture. I did not know Biscuits and Gravy were so laughable. A week before school started was when it happened.
Ernie and I were down fishing by the river when we saw the smoke clouds. They were like streamers gone wrong, and blasted toward us, missing us by feet, then wisked up the hill towards the cottage I had recently learned to call home. I was confused, but Ernie knew exactly what it was, he screamed something that sounded vaguely like NOOOOOO then began running awkwardly up the hill. We could see the cottage as a speck, and from there we could see a green flash that lit up the early evening sky. I could see Ernie's face break and tears were welling up in his eyes. We scrambled the rest of the way and burst into the house, where we found a scene that has been etched into my memory ever since. The four bodies were scattered aimlessly about the kitchen. Ernie's Dad still had his wand tucked into his already cold hands. My mothers face still held the memory of her last feelings, loss and confusion. Ernie's Dad was the only one who knew what was happening, his last words were scrawled in sharpie across the wall. RUN. That is all that was all it said
Running away from the house was like running through molasses, I ran with Ernie until we reached the edge of the woods, and the little light in the back of my head told me that we needed to go back.
We went through the back door as to avoid the torturous scene. Ernie helped me pack for Hogwarts, his movements were stiff, as if his joints had rusted over in the last hour or so; His personality was caliced after that, I couldn't break him. After packing our trunks we began the walking journey to King's Cross station.
It really wasn't too long of a walk, a mere 3 miles, but it took 2 days of camping to get there with Ernie complaining and the trunks not wanting to be levitated. We spent two days hobo camping in King's Cross and woke up to the sound of Ernie's owl hooting furiously. It was a student, so Ernie and I took the hint and went through the magical brick wall and took our seat on the fanciest train I have ever been on. It's a miracle no muggle leaned against 9 and ¾ and fell into the Hogwarts station. We were alone in our compartment except for Ernie's eccentric girlfriend Hannah Abbott snoring in the corner. Once the train had taken off Ernie slipped me a note. It was something else his father had written. It read, "It was Dolohov and Yaxley," I gave a questioning glance to Ernie who whispered…
"Death Eaters" My eyes grew a size but slowly shrunk as the last few days caught up with me and I was knocked out into a deep sleep.
I was awakened as the train jolted to a stop, the same black cloud that killed my parents swept down the hall and stopped at a compartment down the hall from ours. Afterwards we watched a small blonde with radish earrings being dragged down the hall by two death eaters, who we heard addressed Dolohov and Yaxley, I had to hold Ernie back as he struggled with his wand trying to throw jinxes at his parents' murderers.
When we arrived at Hogwarts, Ernie was still steaming but Hannah was comforting him. It is quite awkward being the person in the corner with your weird cousin and his equally weird girlfriend. I cautiously made my way to the Hufflepuff table and took a seat next to Ernie and a really talkative 4th year boy. I got talking to the boy who introduced himself as Stephen Burke, he was really nice. He knew everything there was to know about Hippogriffs it was crazy, but an odd fear of something called an Aragog… He seemed to really like me! I am not used to this sort of thing, not having many friends back in America. We all watched the sorting and were guided back to the common rooms by our prefects. The common room was a fountain of gold, with the signature badger represented whenever possible. A nice girl showed me to my new room, a group of four other girls, all from Great Britain. They introduced themselves as Janina, Bianca, Sophia, and Penelope, they welcomed me like I had never been welcomed before. No American jeers, no stereotypes, I think I am going to like it here in the land of the Union Jack.
The next day the girls showed me to all of my classes, and were full of questions about American culture, mostly just American boys actually, "God, have you ever met Zac Efron?" "Is Justin Bieber the cutest thing or what?" "Do all boys look like Justin Bieber in America?" Apparently the only country Justin Bieber is popular in is England. And no not all boys look like Justin Bieber… Have you seen Napoleon Dynamite? Now there is an American boy for you. Justin Bieber isn't even American, I guess all people from the New World to them are the Americans. While walking into class I manage to trip over a Slytherin's ankle and drop all of my books. Penelope rushes to help me pick them up, I stumble over my words but it must've sounded like thank you because she said…
"No problem, what are friends for?" I wouldn't know, I thought, but on the outside I just smiled and got my things together. We walked into Charms class where I was given a warm welcome by Professor Flitwick , and was quickly flagged over to the open seat next to forementioned Stephen. He quickly chatted me up and told me all the wonderful stereotypes around the room. I had sort of tuned him out until he skimmed over Neil Kildaire, it was love at first sight.
"Tell me more about Neil or whatever his name is," I knew exactly what his name was.
"Well lets see, scores O's on all of his OWLs, is here from Edinburgh, I hear Edinburgh is sexy, he is the biggest jerk in the history of the world, and oh yeah I forgot, every Hufflepuff girl loves him. Every single one, he's a 4th year like us, but somehow is worshipped by upperclassmen, I don't get it." Stephen told me all of this in a hushed whisper. But my thoughts were so lost in Neil's eyes that all I heard was "is sexy… loves him….. worshipped" So I was pretty much hooked. "Did you hear anything I just said? He is a jerk! Libby?" Of course I heard this but chose to ignore it, he was too pretty to be a jerk, I ashoed the voice in the back of my head that heard a hint of hurt in Stephen's voice. And my mind also forgot the look of pain that flashed onto Stephen's face that week every time I brought up Neil, which was a lot. Looking back my brain was really naïve.
The homework at this school was trivial compared to Salem, all the teachers were extremely pleasant, that is except for three. Professor Carrow, another Professor Carrow and Professor Snape, the headmaster. Their teaching methods were cruel, and the distaste the other teachers had for them was obvious. Their sadist methods include using spells from the Dark Arts on students who were in detention. And the students who refused to comply with these teachers philosophies were also tortured. I was scared… Not everything goes according to plan I know, but this is not what I planned for this year.
The next few months went by as flawlessly as I could have hoped for considering the circumstances. I stayed out of trouble enough to avoid punishment by the Carrows. Penelope and I had become really close, she told me how to steer clear of trouble, how to get around the school, and most importantly, how to survive high school drama, something I had hoped to abandon in America with the rest of my old life.
But, sadly, perfect doesn't last forever. Amycus Carrow made sure of that. It was as average as a Tuesday could be. I was sitting in DADA during a lesson on the great wizards of our generation. Naturally all the wizards were death eaters. One by one pictures and bios flashed up on the powerpoint; Lucius and Draco Malfoy, John Dawlish, Thorfinn Rowle, Bartamaeus Crouch Jr., the names had begun to blur together, when two pictures caught my eye, both ironically on the same slide were Antonin Dolohov and Yaxley. Out of instinct I jumped up and screamed "Obliviate!" at the top of my lungs, the projector screen exploded with a rewarding bang. All that was left was the broken images of my parents' killers slowly deteriorating.
Professor Carrow walked up to me with a crooked grin plastered across his squished face. "I believe we will be seeing you in detention with us Ms. McMillan." For that moment the world stopped spinning.