AN/AR: Yep, I know, "She's publishing ANOTHER ONE?" Well . . . After ages and ages of writing them, I finally came up with a CHarmed/Harry crossover idea that I liked. And didn't think was stupidly cliched, at that. So, hope all y'all like it. - Merc.
Summary:Sometimes, when she was a little girl, she'd pretend she was Miss Trudoe's daughter, and didn't live with her aunt and uncle.
When he first saw her, he thought she was a normal innocent: short dark hair and big green eyes, she was nothing special. What a silly thought.
Sometimes, when she was a little girl, she'd pretend she was Miss Trudoe's daughter, and didn't live with her aunt and uncle.
After all, Miss Trudoe ("Oh, c'mon kiddo, call me Prue") was nice, and liked having her around. They looked alike too, with green eyes and black hair. She let her stay after school for detention, too, to help clean up the music room and always listened to her. She told stories, too, about her sisters and her old life in America. She never said why she left though, and always looked said when she asked. So she stopped asking.
Miss Trudoe believed in magic, too. She didn't get upset or angry or scared at all when accidents she couldn't explain happened. Miss Trudoe just smiled at her, shrugged, and said, "Don't worry about it. Magic does that sometimes."
Truly, Angelica Potter wished she was Prudence Trudoe's daughter instead of the drunken woman who's name her aunt wouldn't even tell her.
"You look like you're in dreamland."
Angelica started and looked up from where she had been absentmindedly tapping piano keys. "Sorry Miss Trudoe," she blushed. "I was thinking."
Miss Trudoe smiled. "Well, that sounds terribly difficult. Maybe I should leave you to it."
"No! No. I mean . . . would you tell me a story? About magic?" Angelica glanced down at the piano keys. "How did you and your sisters learn to control it? I try, but it's so hard . . . "
"Scoot over," Miss Trudoe said soflty. She sat down next to Angelica and wrapped an arm around her. "I never wanted to be a witch," she said, shocking the girl next to her. "I blamed it all on my sister Phoebe, because she's the one that unbound out powers. I couldn't always control them very well. For the longest time, I would look at something and it would fall off a shelf, or if I tried to move something, it would smash into a wall." Miss Trudoe laughed a little, and hugged Angelica closer. "So don't worry, kiddo. It takes time. Now go home, it's almost four-thirty."
Angelica frowned, but nodded. "Good-bye, Miss Trudoe," she said quietly, picking her bag up and slipping from the piano bench. "See you on Monday."
"Bye, Angelica."
As always, Angelica took the long way home, walking around Magnolia Road and down Wisteria Walk rather than cutting through the park, like she knew most of the other kids did. She trudged to Number Four stopping often. When she got home it was five o' clock, and she slipped quietly into her cupboard. Aunt Petunia wouldn't check in until half-past and it was supper time. Until then . . .
Angelica reached her arm under the bottommost stair and pulled out a small, leather-bound brown book. It looked like an inexpensive journal one would buy from a bookstore, with the two brass claps on the cover, the stitched edges and ridged spine. Angelica supposed that was where Miss Trudoe had bought it, but she didn't mind. It wasn't something anyone would notice if the looked in her cupboard, and it was the nicest thing she'd ever owned.
Her very own Book of Shadows.
Miss Trudoe had already added a few things to it when she gave it to her, information about Whitelighters and dark lighters and a few healing spells, that sort of thing, but she said the rest should be filled by Angelica and whoever she thought should add to it, like close friends and family. It had been the best birthday present ever, even if she had been given it a month before it was actually her birthday.
Angelica sighed when she realised that, though she'd pulled the chain to turn on her light bulb, it wasn't on. So Aunt Petunia hadn't bought a new bulb and changed it yet. Great. Setting her book in her lap, Angelica closed her eyes and tried to remember the spell - Miss Trudoe had helped her with it just last week, when she'd found her in a closet after Dudley and his gang locked her in, knowing she was afraid of the dark. After a moment, her eyes lit up, and she whispered, palm facing upward,
"In the darkness, no flame in sight,
Greatly I'm in need of light.
I call the powers from across the land,
To create a glowing in my hand."
A small, glowing orb appeared hovering a centimetre over her palm, and Angelica smiled, and looked back down at her book. She wanted to memorise it, and know it inside and out. Miss Trudoe always said that you needed to be prepared, whether you were a witch or not, and Angelica really, really wanted to make her proud. She skimmed over the first couple of pages, making sure she had them memorised already, and got to the page on herbs, where she began reading it under her breath so she'd remember it. She'd just finished repeating that carrot seed helped with fertility for the third time when she heard the tell-tale creak of the floorboard outside the kitchen. Aunt Petunia was coming.
Quickly, Angelica balled her hand into a fist to get rid of the light, shut her book, and shoved it under the stair again. She leaned against the wall and closed her eyes, pretending to sleep, and Aunt Petunia opened the door.
The tall, blonde looked around for a moment before her eyes fell on her niece and she pulled Angelica up by the arm. "Get up, Angelica!" she snapped. "It's nearly supper, now help me set the table before your uncle gets home. For the love of God, why weren't you doing your homework like you should have been, you ungrateful little wretch?"
Angelica shrunk in on herself and ducked her head. It would be useless to say she'd already done her work at school - even if Aunt Petunia believed her, Dudley would find out and steal it from her. So instead, Angelica crossed her fingers behind her back and murmured to her shoes, "I had detention again, and my light didn't work when I came home."
"Speak up when you talk to an adult!" Aunt Petunia snarled.
Angelica repeated herself, loudly enough for her aunt to understand this time, and the woman pursed her lips at her. "In the kitchen," she said after a moment, stiffly. "Set out the silverware and glasses while I put down the plates. Get to it!"
Angelica hurried to obey, idly going over her Book as she set about her work.
That night at supper, Uncle Vernon made an announcement.
"Pet," he said proudly, "We're going on a holiday. The company's looking to expand into Germany, and since I speak the language," Uncle Vernon puffed up 'modestly' here, "they want to send me to scope the place out. It'll be a month and I get a two-bedroom suite at the hotel of my choice."
Aunt Petunia looked thrilled. "When is it, dear?" she simpered. Dudley looked to his father in interest as well, successfully distracted from his hand-held video game for the first time since he got it. Angelica paid attention with half an ear, not really caring what fun thing her relatives got to do next. She'd be sent to a neighbour's anyway, after all. She didn't really hear the conversation after that until Aunt Petunia said, more than a trifle unhappily, "But Mrs. Figg's out of town then, Vernon darling. Who else would take the girl?"
Angelica looked up, sending a silent prayer that she wouldn't get smacked for this, and said, "You could send me to Miss Trudoe's for the weekend." At her relatives' incredulous and, in her uncle's case, thoroughly angered faces, she lied, "It's just, she was complaining today that she needed a second job, and me having to stay for detention kept her from going out to find one. She sounded like she really needed the money, so it would be good for her, and she wouldn't even have to drop me off and pick me up from school, since I'd just wait for her."
To her everlasting shock, her aunt and uncle agreed.
"I'll write a note to Miss Trudoe and you'll give it to her in the morning," Aunt Petunia said matter-of-factly.
"Be certain to give it to her girl," Uncle Vernon said threateningly. Angelica nodded very, very quickly and bowed her head to finish her food. She wasn't needed - or wanted, for that matter - in conversation now, and adding any more to the table talk would just asking for trouble.
That Monday, Angelica ran to school to convince her teacher to take her in for half a month. Miss Trudoe bit her lip for a moment, then nodded. "Why not?" she asked rhetorically. "I'll just drive you over to my house after school that Friday - make sure you bring the things you'll need with you to school that day, okay?"
Angelica hugged her 'round the waist. "Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!"
As it turned out, 'that Friday' happened to be the last day of school. So, Angelica asked her Aunt for a plastic grocery bag, and stuffed it with her other set of clothes, the new toothbrush and hairbrush her aunt bought her, and her Book of Shadows, hidden between Dudley's old shirt and his old pair of jeans. The day went by quickly, and it seemed like it barely took any time at all before Angelica's last day in Year Six ended, and she was dashing to the music room, half- afraid that Miss Trudoe had suddenly decided that she didn't want to take her home, after all . . .
But she was there. Miss Trudoe was ready and waiting, her purse in her hand, and she was standing outside the music room door. "Hey, kiddo, you ready to go?" she asked, smiling at Angelica. The little girl grinned.
"Yup!"
Miss Trudoe's house was only a few blocks from the school, on Nasturtium Boulevard, and they walked there. Her house was two storeys, like most houses in Little Whinging, and had a small, one-car, free-standing garage beside the house. It was light blue, and Angelica could just see what looked like a messy garden in the back yard. She looked up to face her teacher and grinned. "It's brilliant."
Miss Trudoe ruffled her hair. "Thanks, sweetheart. Now come on in, I bought some cookies from the store. You don't hate chocolate chips, do you?" She scrunched her nose a little, laughing at her own joke, and Angelica felt her grin grow wider.
"I LOVE chocolate chip bis-cookies!" Angelica half-shouted, stumbling over using the American word for her favourite treat. Miss Trudoe ruffled her hair again and lead her inside.
Angelica had the feeling this wouldn't be a good month - it would be a great month.