Elle stares at the parchment laying in her hands. Over and over she reads this letter again, until she looks at her watch, to check the time, feeling lost in time and space – twelve o'clock on the dot. Whatever this was and whoever sent it, in nine hours, according to the writer of this letter, she would either find out, or not. Godric Gryffindor. She tries to find a connection to that name, types it into Google, but even Google can't tell her anything about it.
She tries to find a possible explanation for all this, but she just can't. Never ever would she believe in such a thing as magic, it was simply not possible! All the laws of physic, of science, all that stuff children get taught in school, all of it would be wrong and that just could not be the case. Humanity would be just a big and massive lie with this thing called magic. No, not in a million years magic could actually exist. She shakes her head to get rid of the idea of some people with wands and hats and mixing herbs in big trunks. Even if they did exist, why would they hide and not help people out with all their magic?
But on the other hand, she thinks, everything she just read and saw bespoke the existence of magic. This necklace which did not feel like being from this world, from something actual human, and laying a massive milestone around her neck, this letter which was written on very, very old parchment, she could tell by the texture of it, the logo of something unfamiliar on the red wax that sealed the letter and those four symbols on the necklace. It just all seemed so special, so magical.
She lets her fingers slide over the necklace again and feel its embrace. What if it was real? If there was some sort of a magical world out there, hidden from humanity to protect themselves. After all those hunts on witches she could understand them perfectly. What if there were people out there who would mix strange liquids in their trunks and speak spells and could heal people as if it was magic. When Elle was young, she used to believe that there was some sort of a different power out there, but all the laws and school and life has taught her that this power could not exist, only in the believes of people who baulk to see reality.
Her old religion teacher used to say that as long as people believed in something, it was real. And even if it was only for themselves, in their own little, imaginative worlds, it was real. And that's why kids are afraid of monsters under their bed, he said, because they are convinced that there are some giants under their bed, because they've been told so by their parents to stay in bed in night! So every single noise they heard, every movement was blamed on this monster, and this kid would become so afraid of this invisible and not realistic monster, that it would stay in bed all night. That's just another trick of humanity, he said, telling stories to manipulate people, to make them believe in something that's not real.
And when you grow up, you get taught that all this noises belong to different things and that there is no monster, but who knows, professor Stiles used to ask them with big eyes, where does all these monsters come from? Humanity probably was not too imaginative to just invent monsters. What if there was a time, and maybe there still is, where monsters exist, hide under children's beds and looked horrific? How did humanity get the idea of magic? Did they just try to explain something very special and very mystic, or was there actually a time where magic as such a thing did exist. And right now, Elle was not so sure anymore if all her life was only focused on the thought not to believe in things if they were not proven by any scientist. Magic did exist. It must have. Maybe only in a distant memory and all this was a joke, but she was certain, that there must have been something alike out there at one point.
She looks at the watch again. Nine hours. Pretty shitty, that was probably just about the time when everyone was around enjoying themselves, and then she would have to speak to this Godric. If she would even speak to him. What was she supposed to do? Just wait in her room for him to get there? Would he come and knock on their door? Would he just magically appear in her room? And what questions should she ask? Could she trust him if he wanted to take her somewhere?
Elle tried to get away from all those thoughts and focus on the facts, just as her dad has always taught her. She got a present from someone who claimed to be from a magical world. As far as she was aware of, this necklace was not dangerous, and there were not any dangerous other things in this box. It was her birthday today. She would have to organise a party. A party that would start in 6 hours and she hasn't even started yet. She should probably do so now. Yes, she should. Forget about this whole necklace thing and start living the real, non-magical life where she could not just wave her wand and make the cottage clean itself. Would be useful, but that would not happen, unfortunately.
She gets up from her bed, puts the necklace under her white shirt, puts her hair back in to a ponytail and checks herself in the mirror. Deep breathe in. At first she would have to empty the cottage. There were all sorts of things in there – chairs, tables, lawn mowers, scissors, gardening stuff she didn't even understand what they could be possibly used for and other stuff from her dad, her brother and herself. Her mum told her to put all these either in the basement or in the shade next to the cottage, that they could then put all of it away after the party. Elle happily agreed to that before she opened the doors of the cottage to see what a mess there was inside. Not to mention all those huge spiders that were hanging from the ceiling and wandering across the gardening stuff. Ugh, she always dislike spiders, even if she was supposed to like them, as they were useful to especially humans, to keep the flies away.
After making it presentable enough for anyone else, she would have to set up the barbeque place, organize some rain cover as London wasn't great in making decision, it could never decide which weather it wanted to have. Then she needed to go shopping to buy some meat for barbeque, crisps, popcorn, snacks, veg, drinks and some chocolate for Rita. Elle smiles, Rita was one of the thinnest and most attractive people she knew, and still she would eat at least one bar of chocolate a day. How on earth was this even possible?
She had known Rita since they were kids and were put together in a team for a car race. Of course only with those little ones which only children got to play with, and they won against all the boys every single time, with Rita driving the car, doing the best possible corners with keeping balance and Elle pushing the car on the back seat with her tiny feet so fast that all the kids were always jealous.
Then they went to primary school together and were the two girls who always giggled and were liked by everyone. In secondary school they had to part their ways, as Rita went to Oxford into a girl's boarding school and Elle went to a boarding school in Cambridge. They both wrote letters to each other and met during the holidays to see each other again, and through all that they still were best friends. With the age of 15, they both returned to London to go to this 3 years college they always wanted to go to. It was for highly intelligent people with special courses and opportunities to see the world. In this one year they both had been to that school, they travelled to France, Spain and Portugal, and there was even more travelling in the next two years.
Rita had always been interested in law, and justice, while Elle was the more creative and experimental one with being good in scientific subjects, as well as creative subjects. The more time they spent together, the more they felt like fulfilling each other's missing part. Both of them were people who were liked mostly by all people whenever they met a new environment, which made it easy for both to succeed in their young lives.
Elle claps her hands as if to remind her that she had to do things. She had 6 hours until the first guest was due to arrive, Rita would most probably come here earlier to help her out, Matt and Jess would be late and Lin would be here at six on the dot, he was one of the most reliable and punctual people she knew. Ryan and uncle Harry would be here sometime after six o'clock, perhaps half an hour to an hour later, and Ethan would be here perhaps a little late if she could guess, she couldn't imagine him as an early kind of person, neither a punctual of late one. A few minutes after six, and he would be here – in case he would even come.
She sighs and jumps down the stairs, she could think about all that later, now the cottage had to be cleaned and finished. She checks her hair in the mirror and then exists the house to walk to the little cottage of, now officially, hers. Putting some rubber gloves on, she slowly gets to work.
Happy, but exhausted that everything finally was done, she checks the time – five o'clock and seven minutes. She nods. Cleaning up was not even as bad as she thought, the spiders went away by their selves and shopping wasn't a problem either, after her brother offered her to get her to the shopping mall.
"Alright, love?" her mum asks who just came home from work. As the hospital was only a five minutes walk away, she was able to commute quickly between work and home. Elle looks at the big clock on the wall – five o'clock and eight minutes. It seemed to her that time always went a bit quicker when things were being actively done than when she only sat around doing nothing, just like being at home and being in school, a totally different passing of time.
"Hey mum, yeah, got the cottage done, and Jonah gave me a lift to Tesco and ASDA, so I'm pretty much all set for tonight. How was your day?"
"Oh, I'm telling you," she says, clearly exhausted from the day, her eyes having slight shadows below those always blue glowing eyes of hers, "can you remember Mr. Thomas, the old patient that died yesterday during brain surgery?" Elle nods. "Now his family came to the hospital today, with a lawyer on their side." Elle rolls her eyes, there were always these people who just thought that they could get anything out of any situation. In this case from a dead uncle or father – as if the doctor would have done something wrong. Of course she knew that there were cases where this actually occurred. But that was, perhaps, one in a thousand. And in case of Mr. Thomas it was one of the 999 cases where no one would get anything out of the situation, apart from the lawyer who obviously earned a lot.
"The doctor turned out to be on holiday in Spain after finishing yesterday so they tried to make him return to, in their own words, get justice for Mr. Thomas. The thing is that Thomas was deadly ill anyway as he suffered from breast cancer in one of the last states. He actually told the doctor that he should not blame himself if anything went wrong, as death was only a small matter of time. A very gracious and wise man he was, it's sad to see that always the people who deserve to live, die." Her mum sighs, some of her ginger curls falling into her face. Elle smiles to cheer her up and is happy to see it returned.
She quickly mumbles an excuse to her mum before she disappears on the staircase up to her room. In her cupboard were quite a few outfits which she could wear, although it seemed to her that she already wore all of these so that none of them were special enough to wear them today. In the end she went for her casual green trousers, a dark brown leather-belt, a simple white shirt, a necklace with a brown leather-band and a red stone and red flat shoes. She looked at herself in the mirror and was quite happy with her outfit.
Then she straightened her hair so that it would fall down her shoulders in nice curls and clipped some of her hair to the back. Happily she then put some make-up, only some mascara and eyeliner before cleaning her room so that it was presentable for any guests who may wanted to come up here and have a look around. "And that's it," she smiles, closes the window and goes downstairs again. Lucky, her ginger cat, already surrounded her by the last steps of the stairs. Looking down she saw some yellow converse standing next to the front door.
"Rita? Mum, is Rita here?" before receiving an answer, her friend comes through the door and smiles wider than Elle could remember her smiling in years. Her dark brown hair was braided to her right side and she wore black trousers and a beige shirt. "Happy birthday," she sings and places a big box in her hands, "I think you already know what's in there, but I thought it'd be so much cooler to wrap it all up. Never mind the bow, you know I could never do those!" Elle laughs and so does Rita.
"Thanks, Rita! Is anyone else here yet?" she asks with halfway knowing the answer – it was only half past five, half an hour earlier than any guest should arrive. "No, and I helped your mum preparing the barbeque, I didn't want to go up to your room and interrupt your dressing up, so I thought I'd just stay here and play with Lucky, she's so adorable, aren't you," she says, kneeing down again and holding the ginger cat's face in both of her hands. Lucky didn't feel too lucky about that gesture and snarls at her. "Uh, little pussycat, sorry," she laughs at the cat as it walks towards the kitchen, her head held high.
"She's the best," Elle laughs and follows Lucky into the kitchen. She then places the present on the kitchen table and looks outside to the garden. "Took me four hours to fully empty, clean and placing the new furniture in it. Have you seen it?" Rita shakes her head, so Elle shows her around. They sit down at a wooden couch and talk for a bit which then turned out to have lasted half an hour, as the doorbell rang for the first time. As they open it, they find, unsurprisingly, Lin who handed Elle another present, after hugging both of them. The next guests who were arriving were Matt and Jess who happened to have met at the street, only seven minutes after six which was a record in time for both of them. Elle expected both of them way later.
They all sat down for barbeque at half past six, Elle had already given up hope for Ethan to ever turn up at hers, so she did not expect Ethan, along with Ryan and uncle Harry standing in front of the house, Ryan and Ethan looking a bit awkwardly, uncle Harry, as usual, looking happy and enthusiastic. Elle gestured Ethan to the barbeque table, feeling guilty about him, as he was looking like a small puppy unfamiliar with his new environment, exchanging a few lines with uncle Harry, saying a quick goodbye and then leading Ryan to the barbeque table where her mum already put the grill on.
"I think you can do the rest, can't you," her mum says before excusing herself and going back inside the house. Ethan stood up to firstly stand next to her for a few moments and then offering his help to do the barbeque. A bit awkwardly and strange feeling, they both managed to sort of grill the sausages and the other meat, then they put some pineapple covered in honey on the grill and last but not least did some corn.
At half past seven they finished eating and Elle's mum brought out some boule which was happily consumed by everyone except Lin, who was not allowed to drink and Ethan who did not seem to enjoy himself too much. Lin and Elle just started a conversation about some political stuff, with some arguments of Rita who was the one and only when it came to politics. Jess had hooked up with Matt, while Ethan sat on his chair, a bit laid back, checking his Twitter for any updates.
"Hey Ethan, what do you think about the new Israeli president Benjamin Netanyahu?" Elle asks and turns into Ethans direction. The boy paused for a few seconds, looking directly into Elle's dark green eyes. He lowered his lips and lifted his eyebrows.
"I actually don't know much about politics and all this stuff. All I know and need to know is that Netanyahu seems like a person who could actually accomplish peace. I also hope that he will be able to negotiate in the right way in Oslo. That's all I can contribute to your conversation," he smiles a little at Elle, then at Rita and Lin. Rita takes a breath in and looks around her.
"Sorry that we didn't include you in our conversation, that was utterly rude." She gives him a small smile.
"I'm used to not being part of a conversation, my parents hardly ever include me in theirs, and if they do, it's only about my grades, how I should do better in school, do more sport, have more friends, finally find a girlfriend and all that. I'm a disgrace from head to toe for them." He shakes his head and laughs, "I sound like a child who is not respected, and actually I'm not, but please don't treat me that way and with pity, I hate both ways people treat me."
"Of course not! I didn't knew that your parents were that hard on you… you never seemed that way in school," Elle says and drinks her cup of water up, she had enough of that boule and as this drink certainly was the reason why Jess was snugging off Matt's face, she was sure that she wouldn't want any more.
"How are you supposed to act when you're the loser and the biggest shame of your family? I feel like I'm a different person as soon as I step out of the door of our house. You just learn to forget this life you're leading in there and have a second, or even third life elsewhere." All four of them remain in silence for a bit.
"I heard your parents were lawyers," Rita starts, "mine are too. I know that it's hard sometimes to be judged and pushed by them for all your life, since you were able to think and draw conclusions. I learned that it's best to just go your own way and show them the person that you want them to see in you. Sounds harsh and not very helping, but that's what kept me going. And now both of them are proud of me and that I walked my own way." Ethan nods at Rita and she feels somehow relieved and less tensioned than all this was before.
"But you know what, guys? This is a party and I think we should really celebrate!" Lin, Elle and Ethan looked up at her in confusion, not sure what to expect of that argument. "Oh guys, please, I don't mean to go partying on the streets, you know that I'm, and none of you are, forgive me, that sort of people. What I meant was to get out Twister, or Activity, or Monopoly and we'll rock that party!" Elle laughs.
"For a minute I thought that you want to go clubbing. I was utterly confused!" Now all of them laugh. Ryan just gets back from the house, five bottles of beer in his hand. "Don't worry, the blue one is without alcohol, Lin, you won't be in any trouble." Lin nods at him thankfully. "So, what did I miss?"
"Oh," Rita says, "we just decided on playing Twister! Cheers," she says and takes the bottle Ryan offers to her.
"I'll get it from my room," Elle says, puts down the bottle after taking a sip and making her way to the house. In it, all the lights were off already, as her parents were far asleep and her brother gone to some of his friends. She gropes for the light switch and turns the dining room light on. Then she closes the door to not let in any mosquitos and walks forwards as her foot slams against something soft. Panicking she looks down to find an angry cat with her tail held high, hissing at her. "Sorry Lucky," she says and wants to pet her as she jerks away from her in fear.
She jumps up the stairs, not caring too much about making too much noise – Matt turned the music in their garden so loud that a neighbour of theirs told them to turn it down. Still it was quite loud, so Elle thought that her parents were either awake anyway or wouldn't bother the little cracks of the stairs anyway if they could sleep with all that noise.
Finally upstairs, she sneaks into her room and searches in her cupboard full of books and games for Twister. "Now, where can you be," she whispers and holds a big game about ghosts and castles back that was about to fall on her head. "I really should clean up here sometime."
"Oh don't bother, my room is much messier." She turns around in shock and tries to calm her fast beating heart. "You didn't have to make me jump, Mister Smith," she says and turns away to the cupboard to hide her red cheeks. It wasn't only that he made her jump, the boy she was hunting after and finally got to speak was now leaning quite attractively in her doorframe. His white shirt which was pulled out and not done with much effort, the loose red tie, the black tight, but still quite loose jeans, his dark brown messy hair and those glowing brown eyes that looked so teasingly and knowing at her.
"And you don't have to go as red as a beetroot just because I made you jump, Miss Robinson," he came into the room, closed the door and sat down her bed. Elle did her best to find that game a bit quicker to get out of this situation and back to the people downstairs, but she kept on pushing games back that had the urge to fall on her head.
"Can I be of any assistance?" Ethan asks and gets up from the bed.
"Well, if you could put some sort of spell or anything on those games for just staying in place," she says before panicking again. The time! Quickly she wants to look at the time, taking her left hand away from the games she held back and feeling an instant pain.
"Owch," she squeaks as some games hit her in the face. She covers her head with her hands and moves away from the cupboard. A tear drops on her trousers and leaves a small, wet dot.
"Hey, you okay?" Ethan asks, jumps off the bed and knees down next to her.
"I'm okay, I just wanted to check the time without realising that I don't have another two arms to hold those books back," she laughs hastily, feeling a cold hand wiping away a tear off her hot face. Elle looks up at him, as he takes away her right hand off her head and puts some hair aside.
"There is a little cut, we should probably get you to a hospital or something," he whispers and gets out his phone. Elle gently pushes his phone away. "It's okay, Ethan, it's only a little cut, it will heal in no time."
"But maybe it's more than a little cut and the doctors should have a look at it," he says concerned and gets back his phone.
"It's indeed very charming that you attempt to care or actually do care about me, but it's only little, so don't make a big deal out of it, okay?" Ethan swallows.
"I'm sorry, I just don't want you to be or get hurt," he says and looks into those big, dark green eyes glowing at him and remembering him of that soft, fresh grass on a flower field. "You're eyes look so pretty," he says before lowering his lips on hers. She first feels strange, his lips all warm and soft on her also hot lips, but then puts a hand on his head, wanting him to be closer to her, wanting to be one with him, as she suddenly stops and pulls him away.
She looks at her watch again. Twenty-one seconds to nine.
Twenty seconds to nine.
"You need to get out of this room," she says to Ethan.
Nineteen seconds.
Ethan looks confused. "What's wrong?"
Sixteen seconds.
"Trust me, only for once. I'm sorry, Ethan, this is something I have to do. Please!"
Twelve seconds.
She gets up and to her table in which the necklace lies in. She takes it out and puts it around her neck. Now Ethan gets up too, clearly confused about all that's going on.
Eight seconds.
"Hey, what's wrong? And what do you carry around your neck? Is that the Hogwarts armorial?" He touches the armorial and lets his fingers slide over the four house signs.
Two seconds.
Her eyes bore into his warm, brown ones. "How do you know about-"
Elle feels as if she was pulled by a rope around her stomach through the air, her hands, feet and head numb and unable to move, just as if she was paralyzed. Around her she sees moving images, as if someone would forward a movie so quick that it was not possible to pick up any images.
As it finally stops, she lands on her feet, bending forward and vomiting to her feet. With shaking knees she slowly lifts her head, the unpleasing sour taste of vomit still in her mouth. She spits next to her and puts a strand of hair behind her ear, her head throbbing.
Her eyes look around and she finds herself to be in a completely different place than her room. A voice comes from a big chair with a man sitting in it. He has long, grey hair and a white beard which is nearly as long as his hair. On his head there is an emerald hat with red stars on it. It is curled up and down along the very front of it. Right below he had some seemingly glowing blue eyes and half-moon-glasses sitting on the edge of his long, crooked nose. He wears a crooked smile, before making a serious face.
"Miss-," he starts with leaving a gap for Elle to answer.
"Robinson, Elle Robinson. What is this here? Where am I? And who are you? I only wanted to-"
"Miss Robinson, I am very pleased to welcome you to Hogwarts, a school for witchcraft and wizardry. I expected you alone, but it seems to me that you have brought a guest with you. May I know his name? It occurs to me, that I have seen this face before" Elle turns around hectically and stares at Ethan who stares right back to her. She lifts her eyebrows, "do you know this man?"
The boy, equally confused tries to clears his mind. "Yes, Elle. His name is Albus Dumbledore, the probably greatest headmaster Hogwarts ever had."
