Chapter Ten: Memories
The room was just as Jane had left it, her small single bed in one corner, it had once been a four poster but Jane blasted the posts off in a fit of rage when she turned eleven and realized she could never be a regular Hogwarts student.
Above her bed was her window, she called it her window because no one – that she knew of – other that herself, had ever looked out of it. At the end of her bed there was a dark rectangular mark on the wooden floors, this mark had been left by her Hogwarts trunk that sat at the end of her bed for so long that the floor around it had been bleached by the sun.
On one side of the room to the left of her door, was her desk, Dumbledore had insisted on her having a desk to study. This caused yet another argument – although Jane did most of the arguing – about why Jane was unable to attend Hogwarts properly like that other witches and wizards her age.
The only other piece of furniture in her room was a low dresser with a foggy, old mirror over it. On top of her dresser was a jewelry box and the only thing in that jewelry box was a locket.
There were two intertwined snakes carved into the golden, outer surface of the large, oval locket, the snake was curved in a spiral with its tail in the centre. Jane opened the jewelry box and touched the locket, it felt cold and unloved, she had never worn it, it hadn't touched anyone's neck since it had belonged to her mother.
Inside the locket there were two pictures; one was of her mother and father together, they were smiling and laughing, it was moving because, like most pictures in the wizarding world, it was enchanted. The other picture however was not moving because although it was enchanted, the subject of it refused to move. The subject was her father, just a portrait of him by himself staring at Jane every time she dared open it. Jane never looked in the locket because her parents were not good people and she looked like them and ever since she was little, she had always worried that she would end up like them.
Of course, up to this point in her life, she had remained her own person and not been influenced by the memories of their bad ways. Although deep down, Jane knew that she was quite similar and had similarly evil thoughts and urges. It was a huge comfort to Jane to know that she was not placed in the same house as her parents, who were both proud Slytherins, whereas she was thankfully, placed in Gryffindor, the house of the brave and good. How could she be anything like her mother or father if she ended up in the same house as Harry Potter of all people, she used to ask herself when she had thought something particularly foul.
Jane picked up the locket and held it tightly in her hand before opening it, she looked at her father's picture; he was younger in this picture than in the other. He was handsome and dark and she looked almost exactly like him, dark hair, although her's was not as dark and dark eyes, again however, her eyes were not as dark as his.
She looked nothing like her blonde, beautiful, blue-eyed mother, both of her parents were beautiful but in a cold, hard, senseless way, that attracted people to them. This attraction scared Jane because due to the attention she had been receiving lately, she felt more connected to them than ever.
Jane's parents met at school, other than that, she knew very little about her parents, she knew how her mom died but hated to even think about it, let alone talk about it. The only other thing she knew was that her mother had loved her father more than anything but he did not love her. She also knew that her mother did not want her and Jane's father did not know about her until after she had been born. Her parents had never been married and she had never met either of them as they both died in one way or another, soon after Jane's birth.
As Jane stood staring at the locket, she began to cry, she didn't know why, but she cried none the less. Her feet got tired from standing so she dropped the locket on her dresser and sat on the bed to cry. After a long time of crying Jane eventually cried herself to sleep on her self-modified poster-less bed.
Jane woke up still in her school robes and lying on the covers of her bed and not her dormitory bed. After it sunk in that Jane had been missing from the girl's dormitory all night and people were probably curious, she jumped out of bed. On her way out of the room she grabbed her book bag but stopped at the dresser.
She stared down at the locket, deciding whether to put it on or not, she decided that she might as well wear it for at least one day, after hastily doing up the clasp around her neck, she ran from the room and towards the Great Hall.
Still in her clothes from yesterday – hopefully no one would notice since it was only a uniform – Jane sat down at her house table next to Ginny Weasley.
"Where were you last night?" Hermione demanded from across the table.
Jane realized that she hadn't thought up an excuse, "I fell asleep in the library," she blurted out.
"Jesus, Jane may be you should spend a little less time around Hermione, next thing you know you'll be raising your hand in class," Ron Weasley joked, causing all but Hermione to laugh.
After Ron's joking, everyone seemed to ignore the fact that Jane had, "fallen asleep in the library," and they all talked about the usual things and filled Jane in on whatever gossip her friends had failed to inform her of, yesterday because she had skipped dinner.
As Jane, Harry, Ron, Ginny and Hermione were leaving the Great Hall, Harry nudged Jane and said, "Hey, Seamus still hasn't gotten over you, look at him," he pointed subtly towards the other end of the Gryffindor table where Seamus stared longingly at Jane until Dean Thomas smacked him in the head, making Harry and Ron laugh.
"Uh Oh," said Ron, "I reckon Seamus, isn't the only one whose still got the 'hots' for Jane," he chuckled as the group followed his gaze to the Slytherin table where Malfoy sat, staring at Jane as though in a trance, his gaze wasn't as pathetically needy as Seamus' but needless to say it was unsettling.
At this point Hermione had, had enough and pushed and nagged the group until they left the Hall for their lessons.
The Gryffindors, much to their dismay, double Potions with the Slytherins, "I bet we all know who Malfoy wants to sit with," joked Harry.
"Has anyone ever told you how hilarious you are Harry?" Jane asked her voice thick with sarcasm.
"Oh, lighten up Jane; you know we're only joking besides we all know Malfoy fancies you," Ron winked
"Unfortunately Jane, Snape decided that we worked so well with our partners from our first class that he's assigned our seating that way," Hermione winced as she delivered the bad news.
Jane walked up to Snape once in class and asked, "Is it true about the assigned seats from the first class?"
"Yes, Miss Dilerd I'm afraid so, you shall have to return to your seat with Mr. Malfoy," Snape held up a finger as he saw that she was about to object, "Any complaints will simply be ignored, so I suggest you save your breath for something more worth while," he droned smugly before shooing her to her seat.
Once they were given their assignment, Jane started to work on it right away without so much as a word to Malfoy.
"Are you okay?" he whispered briskly.
"No, Malfoy I am not okay," Jane replied bitterly.
"What's wrong?"
"What in the name of dragon's blood makes you think I'd tell you?" Jane whispered
"I'm sorry I stopped visiting," Malfoy mumbled softly but sincerely.
Jane and Malfoy worked together for the rest of the class which wasn't very long because once again they completed their potion to the point of perfection and were allowed to leave early.
This time Jane was the one who raced out of class first, she was furious about Draco stopping his visits but she was equally as furious at herself for caring.