Chapter Twenty-Five – Please Don't Ask
After the initial shock had passed about Dad's breakout, I found myself wondering about what I'd tell Harry, Ron and Hermione about him. They all knew my Dad had been in Azkaban, and it wasn't going to be easy to hide the fact that he was my father from them considering the fact that we both shared the same surname. I decided not to bring it up unless they asked, but I was still concerned that he'd broken out of prison … it didn't exactly back up what he'd told me about being innocent.
Remus had agreed to take the job in Hogwarts, and Snape was going to be making his Wolfsbane Potion for him while he was there – I felt kind of bad about this, because I knew perfectly well how to make the potion, but Remus was worried that other students might find out why I was making it, and then the whole school would find out and werewolf prejudice would emerge.
I'd managed to obtain a summer job at Flourish and Blotts in the first week of the summer. I'm not entirely sure how it happened, I just remember leaving Diagon Alley after buying potion ingredients for the Wolfsbane with a job starting two weeks into the summer for a month, which I would be able to return to every summer.
Working in Flourish and Blotts was fun; it was simple work for a thirteen year old – stacking shelves, taking orders, simple things like that – but the people I worked with were nice and enthusiastic. I guessed they probably took a lot of young witches and wizards on for the summer. I only worked in the afternoons for five days a week, two hours a day, but I enjoyed working there because it meant I was earning a bit of money.
I'd been working there for about four weeks and was due to be finishing in five minutes when the person I was dreading bumping into entered the shop – Harry.
He looked surprised to see me there, replacing books on the shelves and asked me, "What are you doing?"
"I work here," I said, avoiding his eyes. I knew I probably had a guilty look on my face.
"Since when?" Harry asked, amazed.
"Since about four weeks ago," I smiled and braved a look at him. He looked different to the last time I'd seen him; I'm not sure what it was, but there was something different. "You after your Hogwarts books?" I added, knowing what our required Care of Magical Creatures text was.
The book was so vicious; it'd tear your hand off rather than be read. Many of the other workers at the shop asked me to obtain a copy out of the cage we left the books in, because my powers allowed me to handle the books without actually touching them and getting hurt.
As I glanced over to the cage, Harry said hurriedly, "Yes, but I already have a copy of that one," pointing over at where the books were fighting with each other.
"Oh thank Merlin," I replied, breathing a sigh of relief. I tugged the list from Harry's hand asking, "What else do you need?"
I began wandering the shelves, pulling books down for Harry, when I noticed him looking at the poster for Sirius Black behind the counter. My breath caught in my throat, scared he was going to ask me the question, but instead he diverted his eyes and looked instead at a book on a table in the Divination section.
"That," I said, drawing his attention away from the book and placing his books on top of the counter, "is all of your books, and the end of my shift." I smiled and took Harry's gold and placed it into the till. "Where are you off to now?" I added.
"I'm staying at the Leaky Cauldron."
"I'll wander that way with you," I said. "That's how I'm getting home."
I ran to the back of the shop to let Mr. Timothy know I was leaving, and emerged again to find Harry staring at the poster of my father again. "Why are you staying at the Leaky Cauldron?" I asked, trying to take his attention away from Dad.
"I sort of blew up my aunt," Harry replied, picking his books up.
"Do you mean literally blew her up, like, boom? Or do you mean blew up like a balloon?" I was smiling now; this was the sort of thing I usually ended up doing without realizing it.
Harry smiled too as he said, "Balloon."
I slapped him on the back and said, "Well done. How did you manage that one?"
"I'm not completely sure," Harry replied. "I got angry and it just sort of happened. I didn't mean to blow her up."
"I know the feeling," I told him. "Believe me."
"What have you done in total then that's unintentional?" Harry asked, grinning.
I groaned. "Fifth birthday party I breathed fire, I conjured a blue force field and haven't actually been able to conjure it up since, the whole telepathic communication thing? That was a pain in the arse. I've blown things up too …. Boom blow up for me though … I'm still actually working on that one." We were approaching the Leaky Cauldron now. So far I'd been lucky, but I imagined when we got back to school and the teacher's were calling me 'Miss Black' my secret would soon be out.
I said goodbye to Harry, and Flooed back home to an almost empty house, with a wolf currently taking residence in the basement.
XXX
On the last day of the holidays Ron and Hermione came into Flourish and Blotts for their books. Both of them looked really brown from Egypt and France respectively, and again, they didn't notice the Sirius Black – Tara Black connection. Of course this made me inwardly question Hermione's intelligence.
Hermione and Ron weren't the only people I saw that day. I saw Molly and Arthur Weasley with Ginny, and while Molly Weasley and Ginny were looking at books, Mr. Weasley spoke to me quickly about my father.
"Have you told Ron, Harry or Hermione about your relationship to Sirius Black?" he asked, almost in a whisper.
"Are you crazy?" I asked him. "Sorry," I added quickly, knowing how offensive I could be without meaning it. "But, no, I haven't. If they work it out, then I'll admit it, but I don't see why I have to tell them anything if they don't want to know."
"At least you've thought it through," Mr. Weasley admitted. "I am sorry that you have to go through all of this, however."
This was the argument I'd been using to convince myself that no one would figure out that Sirius Black was indeed my father, and it seemed to convince Arthur Weasley too, but it didn't stop me being scared about people finding out, and judging me by my father.
I spoke to Remus again that night, about what to tell people if they asked about Dad, and another burning question was do I tell anyone that the new Defence Professor is in fact my adoptive father? I decided to draw the same conclusion about this matter as I did about Dad; if they asked, then I'd admit it, but if they didn't then they didn't.
All I was thinking as I lay in bed trying to fall asleep that night was, please don't ask … please don't figure it out.
I was dreading this year of Hogwarts.