Written for the Random Character Challenge.
Character: Frank Longbottom, Prompt used: memory.
shattered memories
These are the things he remembers, when the sun goes down and the world turns dark:
A mother, a father, a child. There is light, then there is darkness. Hooded figures. Cackling laughter. A flash of red light. Pain. So much pain.
There are screams, too. Of agony. Of pain. Most of the time, he wonders who they belong to, where they're coming from. Sometimes it feels like he knows.
In the midst of it all, a baby wails. Helpless.
In the morning, when the sun comes out and the world turns grey once again, he has forgotten everything.
There's a woman, there, with him. There are many people, but the woman.
She sits and hums and he sits and stares because she's beautiful, the woman is and deep inside him something stirs whenever he looks at her and it feels as if he knows her.
Should know her.
Does he know her? He doesn't know, can't remember. He tries, but all that comes is darkness. Silence.
But when she looks at him, it feels like he does.
Another woman visits sometimes, tall and old and thin, large red handbag draped over a frail shoulder. She calls him Frank, calls her Alice and when she kisses him goodbye, something tugs at his heart.
There is another visitor, too, and he's his favourite. Blonde hair. Blue eyes. Kind round face. Something about him is familiar, tugs at his heart hard, harder and sometimes, it feels as if he can feel it in his bones, hears his blood sing because he knows. He does.
"Come along, Neville," the older woman says and the name echoes in his ears long after they're gone.
Neville. Neville. Neville.
It's there, somewhere deep inside him. Just out of his touch.
After the visits, there are different dreams.
A baby, round faced and bright eyed as he laughs while his nappy is changed. A mother, kind and beautiful as she bends down, kisses the baby's soft, round belly. A father, wraps his arms around both mother and child, because they're his whole world.
When he wakes, he can still smell baby powder and warm milk, hear the sound of laughter. Happiness.
And then his eyes open and there's nothing again.
The boy stops coming for a while and there's a melancholy feeling that settles somewhere deep within him, even if he doesn't quite understand.
"Your son was Sorted into Gryffindor," the older woman says the first day the boy stops coming, and there's a tone of pride that colours her voice. "I know you'd be proud."
The woman, Alice, she hums from her spot by the window.
And him, something tells him he'd be proud, regardless.
Days turn to nights, weeks, months, years.
He thinks. He doesn't really know. He's long stopped being able to tell time and the only way he knows is by the boy. He grows, and his faces thins, just a little, looses that childish innocence.
Sometimes he talks, sometimes he doesn't and most of the time they seem to be mundane things, but they seem to be important. To him.
He brings people, once. Friends, he says. There's a boy, wild, black hair and round glasses that catches his attention; feels like he knows him (does he know him? He doesn't know.)
Familiar, but his eyes, they're all wrong-bright green and they remind him of red hair and loud, warm laughter.
(Two women sitting in an office, crying, holding hands, the other holding onto their respective swelling bellies. A prophecy. A long-bearded man with kind eyes, hidden behind half-moon spectacles that look at him sadly.
The memory is hazy, unclear, unfocused and it's gone as sudden as it comes.
And then he forgets. He always forgets.)
A woman, young and beautiful cries even as she refuses to stand down, holds his hand tight as if she might never let go. Another woman, shrouded in darkness laughs, cackles, as she points a long, wooden stick.
She grins, maliciously, and it's wrong. A flash of red light. Pain.
Pain and then darkness as she empties them both.
"Grandmum is upset with me," the boy says later, as they both stare at the woman, humming by the window. "She thinks I'm embarrassed, ashamed, about what happened to you. What happened to Mum."
The woman spins on her feet, gives them something that might once have been considered a smile as she heads toward them. There's something in her hand and the boy, he holds out his hand instinctively, as she drops her treasure into his waiting palm.
The boy smiles, and although his is real, it's a little sadder, more subdued.
"She's wrong. I'm not ashamed," he says quietly, fingers closing over the single, empty candy wrapper. "I just never thought anyone would understand."
The woman hums as she sits down in the bed, and Neville sighs, voice soft as he stares up at the ceiling.
"I just wish there was a way I could make you both proud."
A father sits by the window in the moonlight, his sleeping son held in his arms.
He rocks softly, gently, so as not to wake the sleeping child.
"You and your mother are the absolute best thing that has ever happened to me," he says, whispers into the still of the night.
The mother smiles as she bends down to kiss the father and the child, hums a lullaby softly as they place him carefully to bed.
"You should have seen him, Frank," the old woman says, voice shaking with emotion as she paces the room, hands waving in excitement. "He stood up to her, to that despicable woman. Fought like a real Longbottom, a true Gryffindor!" The woman sits next to him, pats his knee and she gives him a smug smile. "He's just like you, Frank. Just like his father."
The boy stands to the side, awkward and embarrassed and something, an unknown feeling sparks deep within him, a flicker of recognition, but then it's gone and it's like it was never there at all.
A child laughs as he's thrown in the air by his father and the mother smiles fondly as she looks on.
There's love in the air, everywhere, and it could fill pages, books, volumes.
And then there isn't, there's only terrified screams and pain and flashes of red light. He's helpless, they're all helpless, there's nothing he can do to help her, help him, help any of them.
And then there's darkness. There's always darkness.
"I might not be back for a while," the boy says after, the older woman having stepped aside to give them some privacy. "Things are getting harder out there. There's a war brewing and I don't think we have much time."
There's another candy wrapper in his hand again, different from the last one, empty, but he looks at it as if it's the most important thing in the world.
"I promise I'll make you both proud."
"Where is he?" a cold voice snaps, demands as he circles two figures lying on the floor.
They stay silent, refuse to speak, and there's a flash of red light and screams fill the silence of the night.
"Where is the Dark Lord?" the voice says again, more impatient than the last. "I don't like to repeat myself, Longbottom, tell me where he is!"
Silence. Then, more piercing screams.
A woman approaches him, her shoe toeing at the edge of his nose.
"I think you need a little encouraging, Frankie, don't you?" She turns to the woman, grinning maniacally as she points her wand at her. "Maybe Alice knows. I think she's close to cracking. Maybe I should just help push her over the edge."
Another flash of red light and his wife screams and Frank summons the last of his strength as he shouts out, desperate.
"No! Don't hurt her. Hurt me, instead...please."
"So you do talk!" Bellatrix says, throws her head back in a cackle. "How splendid! Maybe you need a little help, too!"
Yet another flash of red, and then pain, so much pain that it starts engulfing his mind, taking over his senses as he slowly slips into unconsciousness, teeters dangerously over the edge.
His last thought is of his son, upstairs as he sleeps peacefully, protected by a series of complicated spells meant to conceal him, blissfully unaware.
Then the darkness is there and it wraps around him, slowly starts seeping into every corner of his mind and Frank Longbottom, he smiles, waves goodbye to his last shreds of sanity.
Molly Weasley stands in defiance, her chest heaving, the air cackling around her as she raises her wand.
"You won't ever hurt anyone again," she says, and her voice trembles, not with fear, but with rage.
Bellatrix cackles, arms thrown wide open, malicious grin wide, and that's her second mistake.
The first was underestimating a parent's' love for their child.
A well-placed curse, uttered with malice entirely her own and fueled by unimaginable grief, straight to the chest and Bellatrix Lestrange is no more.
In a deep, hidden corner of London a man and a woman sleep peacefully in a hospital bed, in a room, a ward.
Balance has been restored in the universe; she's gone. Free.
For the first time in years, Frank Longbottom smiles in his sleep.
10 years later
"Mum and Dad, I have someone for you to meet," the man says, no longer a boy. He's older, more mature, still kind-that hasn't changed.
There's another woman with him, although not the same one as before. She stopped coming a while ago and Neville had cried when he'd told them she wouldn't be around anymore; a part of Neville knows Frank had understood.
In any case, this woman is younger, blonde hair, warm brown eyes. His wife. She knows his mum would have loved her, his father approved.
She holds a small bundle of pink in her arms and she hands it to Neville carefully. He grins as he takes it carefully, smiles down at it and his eyes, they shine.
"Mum, Dad, meet Alice Francis Longbottom," he says and he carefully places the sleeping bundle in his mother's arms.
He knows what they say about them, about his parents.
They're mad, people say, whisper, driven to insanity by Bellatrix Lestrange herself.
Don't talk to them; they don't understand you anyway. They're not all there; empty. Just shells of their former selves. They're not coming back, they're gone.
But, in that moment, something sparks, deep inside them, a flicker of recognition as his mum cradles his sleeping daughter to her chest, carefully, delicately, as if she's a treasure she's meant to protect.
And as Neville watches as his parents hold their newborn granddaughter, Hannah by his side, he knows that's not true .
Frank and Alice Longbottom are still in there, somewhere. His parents haven't left him yet. He smiles.
Outside, the sun shines.
A/N: I have literally spent the whole afternoon writing this. Which I know, it's not even long, but in my defense I was typing it in my phone. My back hurts, my eyes sting and I'm not sure if I can completely unbend my fingers yet. Sorry for any mistakes, I'll go back and fix them as soon as I can see properly again.
Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed! Remember, reviews are appreciated. Feel free to leave as many as you'd like. Or don't. That's cool too. Much love to you all. I'm gonna go lay down in my bed for a bit and have a good cry.
-Ev x