Chapter 5 - Holidays with Hags
Gilderoy returned on a chilly Friday night in September, bronzed, happy, with stunning highlights in his hair and a turquoise robe that would have looked ludicrous on anyone else. He told me his trip had been everything he hoped for and more. He'd had the most wonderful adventure, "with a Hag, darling, a real one. She was terrorizing a whole sweet village. And I managed to do something about her. Those Auror days weren't a complete waste of time, you know. I've the most wonderful story to write. It worked, it really worked." We hugged, screamed, and practically danced round the room.
We had the Cocktail Time to end all Cocktail Times.
Followed by a very, very quiet weekend. Or Saturday-to-Monday, if you prefer.
And then Gilderoy set to work with a vengeance. Each morning as I left for the Prophet, I could hear the scratching of his quill. Each evening I'd find some discarded parchments in the bin, and a growing pile on the dining room table he used as his desk. "Do you mind, darling?" he had asked, and I had told him not to be silly. We'd always preferred kitchen sups. Sardines on toast on polished mahogany? Far too 'genteel poverty', thank you very much.
That Friday night he handed me one of the parchments. "Would you look at it, please? It's the first chapter. I've already drafted a few other ones – but I'd like to know … Well, before we have our drinkies, actually … you see, if it's totally ghastly … If you could just give it a quick look?"
I told him I would, took the parchment, and went to my room. I felt literally sick with fear. What if it was ghastly? How could I possibly tell him?
I started to read. At the end of the first paragraph, the sick feeling went away. At the end of the second paragraph, the knot in my stomach eased itself out. At the end of the third paragraph, I had forgotten that I was Rita Skeeter, Journalist, who had to give a professional opinion.
At the end of the parchment, I rolled it up and returned to the living room. "Those other chapters you mentioned …" I said, as severely as I could.
"Oh god," Gilderoy groaned. "You hate it. I knew you would. I knew it's ghastly. You want to burn them."
"No, you idiot, I want to read them. Now! It's fucking fantastic!" I shouted. And it was. It was the most wonderful, rollicking escapist read you could imagine. The critics would loathe it, but it would sell, sell, sell.
He just stared at me at first, and then he smiled.
Whenever I think of Gilderoy as he is now, I try to remember that moment, that smile. I try to remember he once was that gloriously, blissfully, endlessly happy.
Gilderoy Lockhart, Master Twister, had found his destiny.