A Way with Words
The two hour train ride from Chelsea to Dover is great for having a nice, long sleep. This sleep feels even more sacred after a week-long dance camp which starts at 6am and doesn't finish until 7pm starting Monday and not finishing until Friday, stretching out in an empty compartment letting the gentle vibrations massage away at the tense calf and thigh muscles. The conductor called for my stop way too early for my liking, I knew that nobody would be at the station waiting to collect me and I would have to walk home again. The 20 minute walk from the train station to our house at the far end of the esplanade was more than enough to bring back the aches and cramps that a week of practically non-stop dancing will give you. For the first time I was nearly glad that I didn't start the next camp for another week.
No-one was home when I walked through the door at 10pm, which was a bit odd, but I saw a note on the calendar that said they were at some dinner party for my father. I decided to go straight to bed instead of having a shower, the week had been long with early morning runs at part of camp activities and late nights of me and my best friend (room-mate, honorary sister) Annabeth Tullock catching up after spending practically 10 months apart. Annabeth was my only muggle friend who knew about me being a witch, her older brother Ethan is a muggle-born like me, so it is good to have someone that I can tell everything to.
The next morning I woke up to the chaos that plagues our house, Petunia was yelling at Lily, Lily was yelling at Petunia and Mum was yelling at both of them; and they wonder why I prefer to be at the dance studio then at home. Dragging myself out of bed and down stairs I walked into the kitchen, much to the surprise of my family.
"Oh great, freak number two is back," Petunia said scornfully.
"Azalea, I thought you came back next week," Mum asked clearly surprised.
"No, I finished last night. Anyway I just thought I would let you know that I am home and that I am going to have a shower now."
Later that afternoon I grabbed my dance bag and headed out to the end of the pier. It was my favourite place to relax, even though it being the middle of summer there was bound to be lots of people there. Afternoons at the pier were always fun. We are quite a close knit community in Dover, everybody knows everybody, or at least in our area. Someone almost always bring a radio and all us young people spend the afternoon laughing and just basically being kids. This is the only thing that I really like about coming home. To the rest of the world we are a happy and loving family with two daughters attending a prestigious boarding school, but inside the walls of our own home we are about as dysfunctional as you can possibly be. When Lily is home her and Petunia fight constantly, Petunia and myself are not so bad, but if the three of us are together it is impossible. That is why I spend my time dancing, that and I want to be a dancer. I really have no desire to get a job in the magical world, which is why I think that Petunia can stand me more than she can stand Lily.
When I am not in London, it is my afternoons at the pier that help me keep my sanity, just like how Lily used to spend her days with Snape (I don't know what she will be doing this year now that they are no longer friends). It was oddly calm when I got home late that afternoon, which is what tipped me of that something was seriously wrong. There is always noise and chaos in our house. In the month and a half that we have been home from Hogwarts, and of this month and a half I have only spent the equivalent of one week and three days at home, it has not been this quiet. Silence in our house is like the calm before the storm. With three red-heads we have quite the tempers in our family. It almost always ends in one of us storming of in a temper and returning a few hours later, little did we know that it would be different this time.
Lily was sitting in the armchair that is normally only occupied by our father and Petunia was perched at the far end of the three seater, while Mum was sitting in her rocking chair. Immediately I could see what the problem was, it was the second week of August and our Hogwarts letters had arrived. Petunia was alternating between glaring at Lily and glaring at the letters in Mum's hands.
"We were waiting until you got home to open them Darling," Mum told me as I walked through the door of the sitting room.
It only took the simple action of me trying to take a seat next to Petunia on the couch that started the fight.
Just as I was about to sit down she kicked out at me and sneered, "Take the floor freak."
This was the trigger. Lily yelled at Petunia, Petunia yelled at both Lily and Me, and Mum was yelling at all of us.
After a few minutes of this I snapped. "Shut up, just shut up all of you." Snatching my letter from mum I stormed up the stairs leaving a shocked silence in my wake, never had I actually yelled back, seeing as I was usually the pacifist in the family. Grabbing my purse and the bag I was yet to unpack from last night I walked back down the stairs and headed towards the door picking up my dance bag as I went.
"And just where do you think you are going Azalea!" my mother said walking up behind me.
"Anywhere. Anywhere that is away from this stupid family."
"Come back here right now young lady."
"No, I am never coming back. So just back off and leave me alone."
With that as my last sentiment I walked out the door and down the street. After a few hours of aimless wandering I ended up on the train heading back to London, to the only place other than Hogwarts that has ever felt like home.
Taking the last train into the city in the middle of the night is not the smarted thing to do, but unfortunately it was not the dumbest thing I did that night. Walking through the streets of Chelsea in the dark and all alone is a lot different to walking in the daylight with Annabeth and often Ethan as well. It was lucky that I passed no-one as I made my way slowly to the old townhouse that Annabeth and her family lived in. And now for my dumbest act of the night was sitting on the doorstep of the Tullock house until morning when Ethan opened the door as he headed off to work.
The rest of the holidays were quite uneventful. I had my mother put my trunk on the train with all my clothes and books packed in it, as well as several of my belongings, and the rest of the time was spent at dance camps and teaching dance classes for the little kids to make money like I had done for the last few summers. A few days before I was due to go back to Hogwarts Annie, Ethan and I went into Diagon Alley to buy all my school supplies, with Annie dressed in a set of my robes. By the end of the Holidays I had mostly calmed down from the fight but I was not ready to go home nor was I ready to forgive my family.