A Trip Down Memory Lane
We are in some random room on the seventh floor; it is pretty bare with the exception of a few cozy looking chairs, a fireplace, and a stone basin full of a sublime silver substance. It is a Pensieve. I glance wearily at him, and he smiles nervously at me.
"She'll kill me for this, so it stays between us." His pale green eyes flash warningly, and I nod. "I have these because she hasn't been sleeping, and the alternative sleeping draught Madam Pomfrey gave her makes her a bit… tipsy, I suppose is the word. Anyways, I sleep on the couch when she takes it incase Hunter wakes up." He pulls several vials of memory out of his pocket and empties them into the basin.
"Alright, I suppose I will just explain as we go along. So, you ready?" he asks.
I glance from the basin to him. "Do I have another option?" I shrug, and he chuckles a little.
"Well, you could just walk away, but considering all that you have destroyed trying to find understanding, that would just be stupid," he answers. He was just trying to be funny, but it really felt like he drove a knife through my heart. At my fallen expression, he bites his lip. "Right, so that wasn't funny. Sorry."
We dip through the cool surface of the Pensieve, and I find myself standing inside Rebecca's house once again. We are at the top of the stairs beside the room Casey was in.
"This is her earliest memory. Mine is about a week earlier in my tree house. We were three; I asked her to marry me," Howards says and glances over the railing. I follow his line of sight and see a tiny black-haired girl in a white dress crying as she runs toward the stairs. She is unsteady on her feet and has a tiny gash on her forehead. "She fell, outside. It was raining; she slipped on the cement." He gestures to the gash and steps to the side as she reaches the top of the stairs. She stands on her toes and struggles to reach the doorknob. Barely managing to twist it, she pushes the door open and stumbles inside, tears streaming down her face and crying for her mother.
Howards guides me into the room. There is a tall woman standing on the railing of the balcony in a long white nightgown. It whips and blows in the wind, her black hair drenched. Rebecca immediately stops crying and wipes her eyes.
"Mummy?" Her voice is so tiny. The woman turns around, and my God, Cole looks exactly like her, I swear, right down to the way her eyelashes brush against her cheeks as she closes her eyes.
"I'm sorry, baby," her mother murmurs, and she falls gracefully off the edge. Rebecca screams and runs out onto the balcony. Howards grabs my arm and drags me out there as well. Rebecca has to stand on her toes to see over the edge, and the image below is not something anyone should see, especially a three-year old little girl.
"This is why Beck doesn't fly. She is acrophobic because of this." He closes his eyes and smiles sadly. "My mother and father took my tree house and set it on the ground when she wouldn't climb up the ladder anymore."
We leave the little girl crying on the balcony, the scene fades, and we enter another one. "She said no, by the way," he adds as we walk across a cobblestone path toward two arched gates. I don't know why, but that statement made me smile.
If I were to guess, I would say Rebecca is around eleven or twelve. Her dark hair is pulled up into a messy bun, and she is sitting on the ground against a wall, engrossed in a book. "She's twelve," he says. "Casey is bringing Trevor to meet her and her father for the first time. She met him on a trip to Central America; she studied ancient cultures."
Howards sighs again as the sound of three people Apparating causes Rebecca's head to pop up from her book and a large grin to spread across her face. "Casey's eight years older than us. She graduated before we started school. She became Beck's mother after… her mum."
By this point, Rebecca has thrown open the front gate and is practically hugging Casey to death. Their excited squeals and happy laughter are being watched amusedly by two men to the left of them. "The one on the right is Trevor; the other one is Alex, his younger brother."
My eyes automatically flick from the bright smile that is the mirror image of Hunter's to the dark haired man to the left. Alex? As in the man in Hogsmeade? "The one I met?" I ask, stunned, still staring wide-eyed at the man. He has shoulder-length, shaggy, dark brown hair with gentle honey colored eyes, a wide grinning smile, a few slightly crooked teeth, and extremely tanned skin, like Lucy and Moony's after the summer, as if he spends a lot of time on the beach.
He smirks. "Shocking, isn't it? You can see why she had a crush on him here. He's changed a lot. Honestly, if he hadn't called her Bumblebee in Hogsmeade, I wouldn't have known it was him." I nod, telling him I agree. "Watch the way she blushes," he points her out. I turn and watch her as Trevor and Alex take turns pulling her into tights hugs. Her cheeks flush red, and a tiny uneasy smile appears on her lips. "God, I miss that." I think I would miss that, too.
A silvery mist whirls up around my feet, and the scene fades away as he says, "That was just to introduce you to the family."
When the mist dies down we are back in the house but in a room I have not seen yet. Cole is sitting at the piano, playing a sad melancholy song. "Her mum played the piano. My mum always said it was the only time she was ever really happy. Beck played because she did, of course. Beck did just about everything her mum did." As he finishes, Alex strolls into the room holding two glasses of what looks like red wine. "This is at the wedding reception. She disappeared; no one could find her. She had been depressed for weeks. She was losing her best friend, her sister, her mother, all at once. I mean she put on a grin for Casey, of course. She looked like she could not be happier, but we'd sit in my tree house, and she'd cry for hours. I felt so useless when I couldn't fix it."
"Hey, Bumblebee, why so blue?" Alex asks, smiling at her. She looks up at him bashfully and shrugs. He sits down beside her and presses a glass into her hand. "I promise not to tell," he says playfully, and she smiles, taking a small sip. "It'll be alright, sweet thing. She'll be a whole two kilometers away, and Trev loves you. You'll be able to visit whenever you want, after the honeymoon, of course. You've got nothing to worry about." She smiles sadly and places the glass on the top of the piano, refusing to meet his eye. He sighs a little and wraps his arm around her shoulders. A tiny tear trails down her cheek, and he gently brushes it away, pulling her into his lap and kissing her hair. "Hey, Bumblebee, it's alright, no need to cry." She nods slowly, wrapping her arms around him, and he just holds her, stroking her hair.
"That's when 'hey, bumblebee' started," Howards whispers, and I give him an odd look. He shrugs. "I don't know, she always just called it 'hey, bumblebee.' It's like–" He pauses and bites his lip. "It's like she felt safe there, like she couldn't be touched, like everything was going to be alright." I nod slowly but do not say anything. He made her feel safe, and then he hurt her. That is why she sent me away; I made her feel safe; I could hurt her.
The memory fades, and we are at another house. It is Christmas time; a giant tree is in the sitting room with presents spilling out from underneath it. "Fourteen, I think. This is when Hunter… happened." Howards gestures toward the staircase, and I head that way. "Casey was about six months along, I think, maybe less. Anyway, she had a craving for something really odd, I cannot remember what for; Trevor went to go get it. Casey was in bed. Beck's in the bath," he explains, rolling his eyes at something as we climb the stairs. Before we reach the top, a blood chilling scream echoes throughout the house, followed the dull thump of a body hitting the ground.
Cole runs past us, wrapped in a towel, hurriedly swinging a door open. She stops dead in her tracks and glances around frantically. I nudge closer and peer inside the door as she takes a bold step forward. She grabs a lamp off a desk, and as she moves, Casey comes into view. She is unconscious, and there is a man in dark robes on top of her. Cole takes a deep breath, and he hears her. She smashes the heavy end of the lamp against his head as he turns to face her, blood dripping from his long fangs. She whacks him again, and blood spatters up onto her face as he slumps down, unconscious. Rolling his limp body off Casey, she tries to wake her up.
"Case. Case, come on. I can't pick you up, Case. You have to get up." She does not get a response, and she shakes Casey's arm before she notices the blood pouring from the bite mark in her neck. "Oh, Merlin, Casey," she whispers, placing her hand over the wound, applying pressure to get the bleeding to stop.
As she busies herself with trying to stop the blood flow, the man on the floor starts to stir. He grabs her around the waist, she screams before a bright green light flashes through me, and he falls dead on the floor. "You alright, Bee?" She scurries away from the man, nodding feverishly. Trevor sighs relieved before he sees Casey. "Oh, God, Casey!" he screams, running to her side.
The silver mist swirls up again, and we are relocated to the waiting room of St. Mungo's. "She passed out," Howards mutters before pointing her out to me. She is curled up in a chair, wearing much too large healer's robes. There is nobody with her. "Her dad hadn't been around a lot that year. It is when he started to play a more active role in… Voldemort's circle. We were in the States visiting my grandparents."
"Bumblebee!" Alex shouts, running into the room. "Gods, sweetie, are you okay?" She looks up at him, her cheeks stained with tears and her bottom lip quivering. She seems to be confused on how to answer his question and just stares at him blankly. He kneels down in front of her, wiping away her tears. "Hey, Bumblebee, it's all right," he whispers, and she nods slowly before wrapping her arms around him and crying into his neck. "Shush, Bumblebee. Hey, it's going to fine, I swear. It's okay. I'm here, Bee. It's all right. I'm staying right here." God, I told her that.
"Alright, the rest of this is just the shock about Casey not being affected," Howards informs me before placing his arm on my shoulder and pulling me out of the Pensieve. He fiddles around a little bit with the substance in the basin before looking up at me. "Alright."
When we dip back into the Pensieve, we are strolling down an old road, tall trees shooting up from the edges, casting eerie shadows across the dark pavement. The moon is almost full and causes an odd whitish light to glow in little patches on the ground. As we stroll up the street, Howards shivers a little and shoves his hands in his pockets. "Rather chilly for a summer night," he murmurs, and I agree, brushing my hair out of my eyes. "Ah, there she is," he whispers, and I see her tiny figure running toward us, Hunter bundled up in her arms.
"She ran. I mean she just ran from the house, picked up the kid and ran. No wand, no shoes and ran. It was the stupidest thing I could think of doing, and it saved her ass. Who in their right mind would have thought to look for her three kilometers from the estate, passed out on the side of the road? No one, they all just knew she went somewhere she felt safe. My place, Alex's, Casey's, but no, she just took off with no plan and nowhere to go."
I watch her as he speaks. She is stumbling now more than running; she is going to fall soon. As soon as that thought crosses my mind, she crashes hard against the pavement. I glance over at Howards, and he has his eyes closed against the image. "It's alright. She doesn't stay there long."
We wait around for a moment until a small pick-up comes puttering down the road. It comes to a stop by her side, Howards tells me to hurry, and we run and jump in the back of the truck as a little old man clambers out of the driver's seat. He releases a startled gasp and picks them both up, carrying them and placing them in the truck with a lot more strength than his frail body should have. Cole mutters something to him, but we cannot hear what she said. I do not think he could either because he just smoothes her hair and shushes her before climbing back into the truck and speeding away.
The car ride makes me sick, and I have to travel with my head between my knees. Howards is chuckling a little beside me, but I forgive him because honestly, what am I going to do? Vomit on him?
Finally, we pull up to an old cottage. It is deep in the woods, and only a little dirt road leads to it. A tiny graying woman stumbles down the stairs, and she and her husband exchange hushed words before they set out to get Cole and Hunter in the house. "Alright, let's skip ahead a bit. This part is boring."
I glare at him. Damn him. He made me go through the car ride for nothing.
"Nothing important happens here really," he sighs. "They spent about a week here before they took her to London. She emptied hers and Casey's accounts, put everything in Hunter's name, that along with the money her mother hid away for them. That is what is sustaining them financially. She owled Alex while she was in Diagon Alley; he came to get them."
"Right," I mutter as the silver mist edges up around my boots.
This time she is sitting atop a twin size bed with bright orange sheets, craning her neck and looking over her shoulder. There is a vanity table up against the wall opposite the bed, and she is trying to see her back. Her back is covered in sickly bruises, the edges of them tinged green, but the centers are still deep blues and purples. Finger shaped bruises cover her neck, and a large gash sits above her left eye. Her hands are bandaged, and her lip is healing from being busted open. Picking her new wand up off the sheets, she attempts to point it at her back, but she winces at the odd position it forces her to sit in and drops it, forcing down tears. After a few calming breaths, she tries it again. This time she cringes and places her hand over her mouth to muffle her scream.
"Hey, Bee?" Alex calls at the door.
She quickly wipes away her tears and pulls the blanket around her shoulders. "Yeah," her voice cracks, and she mutters "fuck" under her breath before pulling her hair tie out and letting her hair fall across her face, covering the bruises on her neck and shoulders.
"You alright?" he asks.
"Fine," she sniffs, "You can come in if you want."
He pushes the door open to find her wrapped up in the orange blanket, smiling at him. "I just thought I'd let you know that Hunter's asleep." Nodding, she mumbles a thank you. He smiles at her. "Let me take care of that gash, huh?" She smiles weakly and raises her hand to the wound. "And, that as well," he adds upon seeing the bandages. Sitting down beside her, he holds her chin in one hand. "Damn, Bumblebee, you must have fallen pretty hard," he says as he takes in the bruising on her cheeks. She just shrugs and looks to the left. He heals them quickly with a few flicks of his wand.
As he drops his hand, he notices her neck. "Bee, what happened to your neck?"
She shakes her head. "It's nothing. Don't worry about it." She cringes as he tilts her head back, looking at the bruises.
"Those look like fingers, Bumblebee." He lines his own fingers up with the marks and bites down a gasp. "Who did this?"
Pulling his hands down, she closes her eyes tightly. "It's not a big deal. Just please, don't do that." She is doing everything in her power not to run from him.
Alex shakes his head, brushing her hair out of the way. "It is a big deal, Bee. Whoever did this tried to strangle you."
"He wasn't–" She looks down at her hands. "He wasn't trying to kill me, just make me scream."
"Who?" he asks, and she pulls the blanket tighter around her.
"I want to go to sleep," she murmurs, not looking at him.
He nods. "Alright, we have to patch you up first. You can't sleep if it hurts to lie your head down."
Twisting her hair into a bun, he locks it in place with her wand and sets out to heal the bruises on her neck. As he moves down to her hands, the blanket slips off her shoulders, and she quickly tries to pull it back up but she is not fast enough. "My God, Bumblebee," he gulps as he finds bite marks, deep scratches, and bruises all over her.
"Please, don't," she cries before her words are lost in mingled sobs and hiccups.
"Hey," he whispers, cupping her cheek. "Hey, Bumblebee, it's alright. I am just going to fix you up is all. You don't have to say anything you don't want to, and if you want me to stop, I will, okay? You can't stay all banged up, right?" Big tears fall down her cheeks, and he kisses her forehead. "Shush, Bee, it's alright."
When she's settled enough, he sets to work. It takes him about twenty minutes to get rid all of them. Shakily, she wraps her arms around his neck, burying her face. He drapes the blanket over her before encircling her in his arms. "Hey, Bumblebee, it's alright," he whispers, rocking her slowly until she fades into sleep.
As Alex tucks her into bed, Howards looks over to me. "She started sleeping with him two nights later, said she wanted to replace the bad memories with something good. The idiot actually went for it." An angry expression crosses his face before he swallows it down. "She had barely turned sixteen a week before; the bastard was twenty-two."
The silver mist surrounds us again and takes us somewhere new. "She stayed with him for two weeks before he turned them over."
Cole is leaning up against the door, watching Alex make tea in the small kitchen. She's smiling rather contently even though sorrow flashes in her eyes every now and then. She strolls up to him, wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her head between his shoulder blades. She is only wearing a large button up shirt and a pair of socks. "Hey, Bumblebee," he murmurs, turning around and holding her. He is nervous, that is extremely obvious from his expression, but she is too busy kissing him to notice.
After a moment, she pulls back. "I think, I hear Hunter. I'll be back." She stands up on her toes and presses her lips to his before striding from the room.
"Alright, Bumblebee, hurry now," he smirks, playfully, but there is something odd about his tone. She smiles brightly at him before scurrying off to where Hunter is sleeping.
Howards and I follow. "She said it didn't feel right when he said it," he tells me as we walk up the stairs behind her and enter a small room.
Hunter is out like a light, and she strides right past him and to the fireplace, pacing for a moment before grabbing a handful of Floo Powder and tossing it into the fire. "Hogwarts, Headmasters Office," she states, sticking her head into the green flames.
"Ms. Cole!" Dumbledore's voice almost shouts. "We have been looking everywhere for you."
"Yes, sir, I realize that. I just… I was safe," she mutters.
"And now you are not?" his voice drifts back to us.
"I don't think so, sir. I just… Is it too much to ask you to come get me in the morning? I don't think where we're staying is going to be safe much longer." I cannot see either of their expressions, and it bothers me.
"It is no trouble at all, child." His voice almost twinkles. "I can send someone after you tonight, if you like?"
"No, no, the morning is fine. I need to get some things together tonight." The relief is clearly evident in her voice.
"Of course, and you are where exactly?" he asks.
"Oh, um, Alex's," she whispers.
"Your brother-in-law's, but we already checked there."
"Yes, well, I haven't been here… the entire time."
"In the morning, then."
"Thank you, Headmaster," she says as she pulls out of the fireplace. Stopping to wipe any soot off her face in a mirror, she heads back down to the kitchen.
"In here, Bee," Alex calls from the sitting room as he hears her footsteps. She smiles nervously at him as she enters the room, and he tells her to take a seat, offering her a cup of tea.
She sits beside him and curls up under his arm, sipping the hot tea. Immediately, her eyes get heavy. "Was there something…" she slurs, and he nods.
"I just wanted you to sleep well, tonight," he whispers, kissing her head as it falls limply against his chest.
The mist rises up again, and Howards starts to speak. "The group that he gave them to was still pretty new to the ranks. It was a good thing they were stupid and kept everything under wraps. The Ministry arrested all of them after the first night they had her. Unfortunately, nobody knew where that was. I think we come in on day three."
It is a tiny dark basement; the only light is from flickering light bulb, high in the right corner. Rebecca is leaning against the wall, severely dehydrated, her breathing is shallow, and she is shivering. Hunter is bundled up next to her in an old sheet; he does not look good at all.
Weakly, she lifts up her head and strokes his hair. "How you doing, kid?" she asks, her voice dry and raw. He does not answer. "Hunter?" She tries to get her eyes to focus on him. "Hunter, answer me, please?" When he doesn't she pulls him up in to her lap. "Baby, you have to say something." He hangs limply in her arms. "Fuck," she mutters. Lifting a shaking hand to her dry, cracked lips, she mumbles, "You can't die, Hunter. I need you. You can't die."
Her eyes flash in panic, and she screams. "You're killing him! Why the hell are you killing him?" Carefully, placing Hunter back on the ground, she stands up and pounds against the wall under the light, screaming at no one. After a long while, she stops, slumping against the wall and crying. As she wipes her tears from her face, she stares at her hand as if an idea just hit her. Standing up quickly and getting dizzy at the sudden movement, she stumbles her way back to Hunter.
"Hey, kiddo, I have an idea, okay," she tells him, pulling him back into her lap. Propping him up against her knees, she strokes his hair and whispers, "Please, God let this work."
She holds her left wrist to her lips before closing her eyes and biting down on it. She gets woozy from the pain and dehydration, but she manages to cut through the skin. When only a few drops of blood come out, she does it again. After the third time, she gets a pretty steady flow and holds it to his mouth, letting the blood stay on her chapped lips.
Hunter's eyes open, and he grabs hold of her hand sucking greedily at her arm. A smile tugs at her lips. "That's my little vampire," she murmurs.
Soon she becomes light-headed from loss of blood, and she tries to take it away from him. "You have to save some for me, kiddo," she says faintly, swaying. He has a tight hold on her, and he will not let go. "Hunter, stop." When he doesn't, she falls lifelessly to the side. The silver fog comes again and whisks us away.
"Dumbledore found her about an hour later. That was the first time Hunter ever drank blood. He has had to have it ever since. Every three days to keep him as healthy as any other child his age, once every two weeks to keep him alive."
This time when the fog clears, we are in a tiny suite with man in the corner, humming "You are my Sunshine" loudly as he rocks back and forth. Howards smiles at him before turning to me.
"This is around Christmas time of sixth year. She was supposed to get to see him at his safe house. The person who was to take her never showed so she set out on her own. She was not gone two hours before they found her. They didn't know she was going to him, but they knew she knew where he was so they brought her here." He stops and tilts his head to the side. "Do you hear the screaming?"
I turn my attention away from the humming man in the corner and listen. Blood-chilling screams can barely be heard, coming from somewhere outside the room. I nod. "That'd be Beck. Six hours of that. I don't want to see it. What happens next is bad enough," he informs me before sitting down on bed.
I drop down beside him, and he nods toward the man on the floor. "That's Michael. He is a vampire. Never once in his life killed someone. Everything Beck knows about how to keep Hunter's cravings at bay– she learned it from him. That song is what he focuses on when the cravings get to be too much. He has not had anything in three days. He is about to go bonkers, especially with all the blood he can smell from Beck." The doorknob rattles, and Howards looks up. "Ah, here she comes."
A sickly thin man comes in, dragging Cole behind him. She is limp, broken, bloody, and barely breathing. He is dragging her across the floor by an arm. The moment she is pulled into the room Michael starts singing loudly and rocking in the corner. When the man leaves, Rebecca tries to get up at least to a sitting position, but she cannot. Her entire body is quivering, and after a second attempt, she just lays lifelessly in the floor.
Between the words of his song, Michael screeches, "Get the hell up off the floor, and get into the shower, or I am going to kill you!"
"I can't," Cole murmurs weakly.
"I don't care if you can't. Do it!" he roars, and she tries to get up again. She manages to get to her knees but collapses when she attempts to stand. "Crawl, damn it!"
She does as told, dragging herself across the room. When the water is running, his shoulders relax a bit, and he leans back against the wall, ceasing his singing. She is sitting in the shower fully dressed, just letting the water pour over her. "So, niña, what did you do to get yourself into this mess?" he asks softly.
Cole sniffles, rubbing her nose. "Snuck out, I guess," she answers weakly.
"No, niña, that gets you detention or grounded. This," he waves his hand, "takes a bit more," he laughs. He has a faint Spanish accent.
Leaning up against the shower wall, Cole sighs heavily. "They are after my nephew; I know where he is at," she explains, her eyes fluttering closed.
"Niña, don't go to sleep on me. I am sure they bashed your head against something quite a few times. You fall asleep, and you might not wake up," he tells her, standing up and coming to sit on the bed so he can see her. "Your nephew– he is even younger than you, then? What could he have done at so young an age?" he asks, and Cole's eyes flick to him.
She smiles weakly. "He's half you, half me."
A wide grin stretches across his thin lips. "So, the rumors are true then." She sniffs and nods, closing her eyes again. "Niña, I can't shake you awake. You have to stay up on your own." He tells her, trying to keep himself on the bed.
"I didn't get to see him on his birthday. I didn't want to miss Christmas, as well."
"Does he… drink?" he asks slowly.
Nodding, she says, "Since the end of August. He was dying… I didn't have a choice."
"He didn't before?" He turns away from her, clenching his hair for a moment.
"No," she sighs. "We were… in a cell… three days. He was dying."
He nods slowly. "I understand, niña; do not fret."
Howards stands up and gestures for me to follow. "The rest is just talk for a while. I just wanted you to see that he was good."
The first person I see in the next memory causes me to gasp. "Bella?" I say aloud. Howards glances at me and nods, but he does not say anything.
"You lot are useless, she's a measly little girl. How incompetent can you be?" She scowls, walking into the room, dragging Cole behind her by her hair.
Bellatrix throws her forcefully into a chair, and Cole bites down a scream. She circles her slowly for a moment before stopping in front of her. "Aw, is the little one scared?" she asks mockingly, stroking Cole's cheek. Cole does not say anything, but the fear in her eyes is obvious. "You should be," Bella sings, pulling a dagger out of her robes, grinning widely. "Lovely, isn't it?" she asks. Cole simply looks away. "Oh, no, poppet," she places the tip of the blade under Cole's chin making her turn her head back to her, "you look at me and you answer me. Isn't it lovely?" Cole does not answer. Bellatrix drags the blade from under Cole's chin up her cheek and into her hairline, slicing her pale skin. As soon as the cut appears, it knits itself back together. "I am going to slice you to bits, over and over again, poppet, unless you tell me where he is."
Cole looks like she is going to say something, and Bella leans closer. Cole spits directly in her face.
"You little whore!" she screeches and whacks her hard across the face. Cole tumbles out of her chair and is not able to pick herself up. "Oh, you want to screw with me, do you, poppet?" Bella murmurs lowly, wiping the spit from her face. "Let's play then."
She yanks Cole up by the back of her shirt collar and throws her backwards into the chair, making sure her chin collides with the wooden back. In one swift movement, she digs the dagger into Cole's back, slicing through everything the blade will cut through from the top of her neck to the edge of her knickers. Cole does not do anything more than gasp.
Leaning over her Bellatrix whispers deathly, jabbing the dagger into Cole's side, "How many times do you think it'll take before you can't heal any longer?"
A shiver runs up my spine, and Howards whispers, "Two hundred sixty four times," tapping me on the shoulder so we can leave the Pensieve again.
He drops down into a chair as we appear back into the odd little room. "They attacked the house and found her after that. Michael was dead, the dagger driven through his heart. Beck was covered in both of their blood. She never talks about what happened, and nobody really knows for sure. I think she killed him. I think she killed him before he killed her…" His voice fades off, and he shakes his head before glancing up at me.
"The Healers couldn't get the wound to stay together so a muggle doctor came in and stitched her up. She died after that. She didn't smile, she didn't laugh, and she didn't talk to me. She was so lonely. That is why she started sleeping around; at least, that is what I think. Not only did it take her mind off everything for a few moments, but also she was connected with someone for a while. She stopped caring about anyone but Hunter. Not there was really anyone left." Running his hand through his hair, Howard sighs, "Now, do you get it?"
"The people she trusts are the people she hurts and the people who hurt her," I say sadly, sitting down into the chair opposite him.
"Yeah," he sighs. "And then the stupid little witch went and got herself attached to you… Then you screwed everything up by playing the damn knight in shining armor."
I glance up at him, smiling faintly. "I don't know how to be anything else." He sighs heavily and opens his mouth to say something when someone knocks on the door.
Standing up and pulling it open, he smiles tiredly at Professor McGonagall. "Professor, is there something I can help you with?"
"Actually, no. Mr. Black?" She looks over him and directly at me. "Lucy's is in the Hospital Wing. She is asking for you. Come along, please," she says sadly, and I practically run out of the room.
O
thank you for reading