A/N: Sorry these things take so long. When one uses actual humans to test dialogue on, sometimes you run out of them and have to buy new ones –no! Wait! That's not right…where do I get my humans? Oh, yeah, I remember. I frolic around chatrooms, pick the brain of my poor beta reader until she just up and solves whatever problem I have without further ado, and talk with relatives at home. Sounds easy enough, but- naw, it kinda is. Ah, well. Any complaints about this chapter's storyline may be addressed to me, and if they are good ideas, I will implement them, and if not, Shara Michelle and I will merely laugh our heads off at them later. J. Here you go.
Chapter Forty-Seven: An Emergency
'You ask me if there'll come a time when I'll grow tired of you. Never, my love…You wonder if this heart of mine will lose it's desire for you. Never, my love…What makes you think love will end when you know that my whole life depends on you?'
-The Association, ©1967 Tamerlane Music.
"So, how have you been, my dear?"
"Honestly! You saw me last night, Draco!"
This was how Malfoy liked Julie best, smiling and ready for any excuse to have a lively argument. Lately, she had been distracted and even dire, presumably worrying about the mission. Since the announcement of the Drama Club's next undertaking, though, she had cheered up considerably. Draco made a mental note to stop beating himself up for suggesting it. He kissed Julie gently on the lips.
"I always miss you when you go away."
"To sleep and then to breakfast, then two classes?"
"Speaking of, are you sure noone will notice you're cutting lunch?"
"Mitchie's covering for me if anybody asks."
"She knows?" For a moment, Draco went white as a sheet. The idea of the Yank trusted with everything he had come to hold so dear was not the nicest one in the world.
"Since 'Much Ado About Nothing,' actually."
"She figured it out?" That was even worse. The idea of it being so obvious was…well, several obscenities came to mind.
"No, it was an exchange of dire secrets. She won't tell, trust me."
"I can trust you. Merlin knows 'bout Americans."
"That's my almost-sister you're ragging on, there. And are you so certain you can trust me?" Julie gave Draco her best Slytherinish look. "I mean, after all, I am the treacherous Dark Lady."
"Only a role, Julie. You aren't Dark."
"Well, I'm the one and only Gryffindor day-tripper."
"One and only what?"
"I dated two guys at once, you included."
To Julie's amazement, Draco didn't even look stung.
"That's incredibly common in Slytherin. And you can't afford to be exclusive the way I can. I don't mind if you see other guys."
That was a lie, actually, seeing Julie talk with Donaghan at meals had been like watching a wolf circle your pet bunny…only worse. The idea of Julie not staying with him was too horrible to think about, but Draco knew she needed her freedom.
"Are you sure, Draco? I'd kind of rather not, just…don't know why, just don't want to look around when I've got you."
"Julia, you're not even quite sixteen years old. I don't want you to regret anything by sticking to a man twice your age."
"Draco, would you please quit saying that?" Julie asked, decidedly put out. "You aren't any more twice my age than Mitchie is! Am I like any sixteen-year-old you've ever met?"
There was an uneasy silence as Draco nodded. Instantly Julie knew which he meant and within seconds she had departed wordlessly. He tried calling after her, but knew it was useless. He was a fool. Even had the circumstances not been as they were, there was no surer way to lose a girlfriend than by saying she reminded you of her mother.
It occurred to him that the resemblance had nothing to do with why he loved Julie. And yes, it was love now, he was certain. He didn't even especially like Hermione until she was married to Severus, and even then, they were more likely to argue than speak nicely. Draco was still a little confused by the idea of Julie really being their child. It wasn't her resemblances to her parents he'd fallen for, but rather the beautiful, intelligent, clever and yet so fragile girl or woman she was growing up to be. Had he lost her now?
What he wanted to know now was why he wasn't bothered by her age or family anymore. When he'd met her, the feeling of near-incestuousness was so thick you could slice it, but at some point after he, Severus and Harry, had taught her to fly she had proven herself equal to all his years. When the two of them were alone with Severus, even, Draco couldn't help but feel as if it were right and pre-ordained. The professor was more of a surrogate father than a friend usually, and if Draco really admitted it Hermione was actually important to him as well now, and not just by virtue of her loving his mentor. She had accepted him first among all of those touched by the war save Snape and Dumbledore himself as not evil and even worth liking. If there was anything Julie had gotten from her that he liked, it was the sense of boundless affection to comfort anyone.
But these kinds of thoughts were useless with Julie mad at him. Taking his favorite quill from where it perched by the inkwell on his desk, Draco started work on his sonnet for Judy's drama club, knowing that was when he would see her next but for Charms class this afternoon. He was not looking forward to her treating him like she did her dad in class that day, for it was certain she would when she was put out with him.
*****************************************************************
Julie walked into lunch ten minutes late and joined her friends. Only Mitchie gave her a quizzical eyebrow, to which she responded with a look somewhere between exasperation and perfect hate. The Yank adjusted her glasses. She understood.
"Did you finish your paper, then?" Jen asked her.
"Paper? Oh, yeah. It's a little bit harder than usual since I've spent more time memorizing lines."
"We were just talking about decorating Jen's new room over the holiday," Chloe said. "Did you ever get around to doing yours?"
"Decorate? I thought they sort of came pre-decorated."
At this, Chloe made a superior French face.
"Fine, then, we'll have to do yours as well. Maybe if you coordinate the colors with the Castle of Ferretage…"
"Chloe, wouldn't Mitchie's room be better?"
The Yank grinned and Chloe made yet another face.
"I've seen that excuse for decorating…frankly, I'd just rather not go in there."
Julie smiled at last. Mitchie's room was decorated in the traditional American style known as 'hole-in-the-wall chic.' The principle was that it had been developed in rooms where plaster occasionally fell off the walls, so the decorator covered every available inch with posters, photographs, and the like. Julie suspected that her friend had taken it a bit too far in the excess of freedom from her foster parents, who had not let her put up so much as a 'Days of Future Passed' cover, and indeed, walking into Mitchie's room was a bit like a field trip to Spencer Gifts. There was blacklight, there was a lava lamp, there was a sort of semi-altar devoted to pictures of her parents, her long-passed-away collie, and what Julie thought looked like a more mismatched London had England's capital been situated at the intersection of three rivers. It was definitely not up to Chloe's high standards of taste.
"Do you have some objection to my room, Chloe?" Mitchie asked, smiling.
"Yes."
"Good. It's about time it offended somebody. Everyone else here just seems to be fascinated."
"Oh, so the point of that black hole's to offend people?" Chloe asked in her superior way.
"Precisely, it's exactly to my tastes and noone else's. Would you believe Donaghan likes it in there?"
"And just how much time does he spend behind your door?" Jen asked. Mitchie reddened slightly and shrugged.
"I've been getting some help with History of Magic. Binns keeps putting me to sleep and the book's just…well, it's hard as hell to read the entire text."
"But if you weren't a werewolf, you could still pet the unicorns?" Jen persisted, her head twitching a little at the neck. "I just have a little bit of a theory I'm curious on."
Mitchie looked sort of guilty.
"Well, it's certainly not for lack of wanting to…but wolves mate for life, so I kind of can't unless I want to be stuck with him for life."
"Really? And you, Chloe?" Jen inquired. The French girl shook her head without the slightest change of expression.
"I'm twelve."
"Starcatcher?"
"Never had the inclination or the time."
"Okay, my theory's proved. Gryffindors shag less than Slytherins."
"Wasn't that kind of obvious?" Chloe asked. Jen sighed, half-ruefully, half-amused.
"If you were a Slytherin, Frenchie, pretty as you are with that blond hair, I doubt if you'd have lasted up 'til your twelfth birthday. Snape, I don't think even your dad could've protected you. And Wolfy, well, you might have had to bare that star a little bit, but even that wouldn't hold them off forever. It's really kind of better in Gryffindor."
"Kind of?" Chloe asked in abject horror. "First-years…?"
"Some. Most girls lose it in fourth-year or earlier. And the guys…well, unless they're pure-blooded enough to tuck it back a bit, most of them get used for sport by the older girls within their first four years. It's been that way for years beyond, I'm told."
"And you…?" Mitchie was bold enough to ask. Jen counted what year she had been in and leaned on her hand with the fingers showing so Chloe wouldn't realize. The werewolf's eyes grew wide and she swallowed. "Cripes, you were…Jen, I'm-"
"Shocked?"
"Well…sorry's the word that springs right to mind."
"Aw, don't be. It's just a matter of norms and what house you're in." For some reason, this made everyone look at Julie. Suddenly Mitchie grinned.
"Didn't your dad give the word to put you in Gryffindor?"
And the heavy atmosphere was shattered by laughter just before an owl landed on Julie's head and began to nip at her white streak.
"What are you…oh, thank you." Julie gave the post owl a bit of piecrust and it flew off. "A letter from the Muggle transfer address…must be either Grandma or one of my Broughton mates."
"Your grandmother's Muggle?" Mitchie asked.
"Yeah, she and Grandpa both, they're dentists."
"You have got to be joking me!"
"No, really, they're Muggles. My mum's parents."
"Dentists in England?" Mitchie asked, grinning. Julie shot her a look of mild distaste.
"Why does that explain a lot of the minty way you and your mother smell?" Jen asked. "If Lyff ever brushed his teeth, half of them'd come off."
"It's from Ros…she's being adopted by the worst people imaginable."
"Who's Ros?"
"Rosaline Quartertil, my friend from Broughton." Julie handed Mitchie the letter to read, but the Yank passed it to Jen.
" 'Dear Julie, I have a minor catastrophe. Some people from near Cardiff want to adopt me and I don't want to go. Honestly, Jules, they're awful. I know they just want me to take care of their kid, who's annoying as hell. Miss Parkington's gone, so if you could please think of some way to jinx it up? I don't want to leave Broughton two years before I go free. Jack said he saw you around Christmas and says hello. Deus dona nobis pacem, sincerely, -Rosaline. P.S. How are your parents treating you?'" Jen put down the letter a second and looked at Julie oddly. "Miss Parkington?"
"We went to the same orphanage, she used to teach there before she met Uncle Ron."
"I thought it was weird she seemed to know you."
"Didn't you see the tapes of Julie's old Drama Club?" Mitchie asked. Jen shook her head, which was twitching again.
"Nope. Couldn't hide some that day." She indicated her still-purple bruised face. "So this Muggle needs you to come bail her out?"
"Yeah, I guess that'd be the best way to do it…" Julie said, apparently deep in thought. "I don't suppose Slytherins cut class often?"
"You're going to miss Charms, Julie? …oh, yeah." Mitchie looked suddenly eager for adventure. "Need some company?"
"I was going to ask the two of you to come…Chloe, please don't be offended, but you're still a first-year and your parents are in the send-Howler capacity."
"I've got an exam, actually, and I won't be offended if you let me redecorate your room."
"This weekend?" Julie offered, holding out her hand.
"Done."
"Jen, if you don't want to," Julie started.
"They've already sent me a Howler for dropping Lyff. They haven't written since they heard I changed Houses. There's no problem there."
The Griffie girls gave Jen sympathetic or outraged looks.
"That's inhuman."
"That's Slytherin politics. When do we sneak out?" Julie looked at her watch.
"Lunch's almost over. I'm going to write Mum a note saying where we're going, we'll get our coats, and go."
"Coats?" Jen asked. "I've only got winter robes."
"Don't worry, I've got a spare that should fit you," Mitchie offered. "Our school uniforms should be alright, right, Julie?"
"Right. By the way, Jen, the gold-and-red does suit you."
"Thanks, Starcatcher." Jen still wasn't comfortable using Julie's given name. Actually, Mitchie's uniform was the first one she'd ever owned, and her tie was perpetually too loose and her collar never done up past her collarbone. Jen's, by contrast, was vaguely military in the way she maintained a state of complete order about her clothes. The only things she and the Yank had in common were green eyes and a similar nose and jaw. Julie had the middle ground, with only slight deviations from perfection in her uniform. Together and without black robes over top, they might have passed for almost any other English school. After sending the note of their whereabouts to Professor Granger via Angus, they took off on broomsticks for Cobham, London.
It was uncanny the way all of them looked related.
*************************************************************
"Daddy, I want crisps," a small boy whined.
"Later, Vernon," his father promised. "As soon as we've got your big sister's papers signed."
The 'big sister' in question scowled even darker than she had been. Vernon began to howl.
"I don't want a big sister! I want crisps now!"
"Dudley, I can handle the paperwork," his mother offered. "Why don't you go find a shop and get the boy some crisps?"
"Alright, Gara." The paunchy man kissed his much prettier than expectable wife on the cheek. Rosaline thought she detected a slight cringe there, and Gara had yet to call her son Vernon anything but 'The Boy.' She would be damned if she'd go live in a house with this unholy trio, though Gara had an air of discontentedness about her Rosaline felt sympathetic to.
"Rosaline, how do you spell your surname?" the woman asked.
"Quartertil, just the way it sounds, one 'l'."
"However did you come by it, if you don't mind my asking?"
"I was found on the steps at a quarter 'til, obviously." Gara flinched from the orphan's icy reply. Just then, three girls, two dark and one red-haired, entered and Rosaline cheered up considerably. "You should hear some of the names they give us. Why, I've a friend they called 'Starcatcher.'" Julie waved at her behind Gara's back.
"And Rosaline's such a beautiful first name."
"Shakespearean. They opened the Plays at random to choose first names."
"Really? My first name's Polgara, actually, but Dudley doesn't like anything that sounds remotely like magic. He's a bit of a superstitious one."
Suddenly, Julie straightened and looked closely at the little boy.
"And what's your name?" she asked the pudgy child.
"Vernon Dursley, I'm not to talk to strangers." He stuck out his tongue at her and burst into tears when Julie stuck out hers right back with a grin. "Mummy, she-"
"Not now, dear," his mother said, just as his father arrived. "Vernon, you have to sign these here."
"Alright," he said, moving to accept the clipboard. Suddenly, Julie ran over and hugged him like a brother.
"Cousin Dudley!" she exclaimed. Mitchie got it and cracked up into fits.
"I beg your humble pardon?" Dudley asked, horrified.
"Daddy's told me so much about you and Aunt Gara! This must be Vernie." Julie crouched and spoke to the little boy. "I'm your cousin, Hermione Potter."
"And I'm Lily," Mitchie said, putting out her hand, which Gara shook and Dudley avoided like the plague. Jen also stepped forward.
"My name's Ginny."
"I heard your cousin and his wife had twins…or triplets, dear," Gara said. Dudley looked as if he'd swallowed something unpleasant. Dark haired, just like Harry, two of them had green eyes and one glasses…wasn't that Wellesley or what's-her-name a redhead?
"Triplets," Julie supplied. "So, what are you doing here?"
"Er, I…" Dudley, profoundly terrified, indicated Ros, who looked truly amazed.
"Oh, you're adopting Ros! I thought you and Aunt Gara were Muggles!" Julie gave him a bigger grin and yet another hug. "That's so nice of you!"
"Mug…b-but…?"
"Oh, Ros goes to school with us," Julie lied. "Top of our class when she isn't busy with Quidditch-"
"Well, er… Gara, we must be going," Dudley whispered, looking suddenly at Rosaline as if she were a very large sea slug. "I'm sure someone else will be happy to adopt-"
"You mean we aren't taking her?" Gara asked, a bit angry. Rosaline stood up and hugged Julie.
"Really, Mrs. Dursley, it's alright with me. I've got my friends."
"Are you sure?" Gara asked a little sadly, as Dudley tugged her wrist to leave.
"Oh, yes. I'll be eighteen in two years anyway."
"Oh." Gara, despite being pulled toward the door, looked genuinely sad. "Well, here's my address, so that you can write," she offered Ros a business card.
"Now, Gara." Dudley commanded.
"Er, goodbye!"
And with that, Rosaline was saved from a cupboard under the stairs. The instant the Dursleys were gone, the Griffies burst into absolute fits of laughter. Rosaline looked at them in positive awe.
"Do I even want to know what you did?"
"'Extempore from my mother wit,'" Julie explained.
"Seriously, though, he was terrified! Are you really his relatives?"
"Merlin's arse, no! This is Michelle Tyler and Jen Blodgett. Griffies, this is Rosaline Quartertil."
"A splendid joy to meet you both," Rosaline greeted. "Are you three cousins then?"
"Nope," Mitchie announced. "I'm Julie's parents' foster-kid and Jen's in our House at school. Raw coincidence."
"Who did he think you were?" the Muggle asked.
"Well, I have an honorary uncle, my mother's friend…" And, excising all references to magic, Julie explained the relationship between Harry Potter and the Dursleys. "So the idea of you being friends with us scared him away. You must be part-Irish with this luck."
Rosaline gave them a look as if to say 'I'm not stupid.'
"You're witches, aren't you?" she asked.
"What?"
"Oh, come on! Miss Parkington gets engaged to a guy who can mysteriously just appear when he's needed, wasn't his name Weasley just like your uncle Harry's wife? That guy's paranoid about magic, I bet the three of you flew in on broomsticks."
Julie suddenly looked caught. In her most cynical voice, she admitted:
"You've caught us, Ros, brooms and everything. We're not only witches, but we play a game on our broomsticks called Quidditch. Mitchie here's dating the team captain, she's a werewolf, and I'm learning to turn myself into an animal at will."
Rosaline laughed.
"You are really the reigning queen of bullshit, still, aren't you? A werewolf! God!"
The three witches laughed nervously, relieved that it was being shrugged off. "How's that professor you introduced me to?"
"Oh, Draco? He's …good."
Why Mitchie suddenly had to stifle a giggling fit, Jen and Ros would never know.
"So, what are you lot doing here? Didn't you have classes?"
"We skived off the last few to –er, come up here." Julie stopped herself from saying 'fly' just in time.
"You talk different, Julie," Ros observed. "Since when do you say 'skived off' and not 'splintered'?"
"It must be my parents' influence. Neither of them is from the Cob."
"Ah, well. One more Broughton-brogue bites the dust. Now you've gone right Manchester, you have."
"You think I'm bad, listen to Mitchie."
"Strange tag, that," Rosaline said.
"What?"
"She means your name," Julie translated.
"Oh. It's actually short for Michelle Isolde Tyler, sort of like you're 'Ros.'"
"God, you're a Yank," Ros observed in awe. "Do you know about the difference between chips and crisps?"
"Yeah, and bonnet and boot and biscuit. It all translates."
"You know Starcatcher from the orphanage?" Jen asked, her right hand shaking.
"Know her? Julie's one o' me best mates! Remember when we stole the street mark?"
"Yeah! And I shorted out the electric drill!"
"Jack was talkin' about that just t'other day, about when you an' me 'ad to sneak it back in the dark and we 'ad it on sideways and traffic went mad. That was bugger-all funny."
"Wasn' it?" Julie heard her 'Broughton-brogue' starting to return. All the orphans had exaggeratedly proper language around adults and people they were mad at, but thick, almost Cockney slang in friendly company.
"Why don' you an' these come get some funnies with me an' our ol' crowd?"
"Funnies?" Mitchie asked. Julie and Ros explained together.
"Funny; joke." Blank stares. "Cherry Coke."
"Oh, that rhyming slang," Jen recognized. "I never could get the hang of that."
"Why, where you from?" Ros inquired.
"Don't know if you'd know it; village of Blodgershire?"
"Nope, never heard of it. Farming town?"
"Er, no, actually it's mostly old money snobbish types."
"Sounds buggered annoying."
"Oh, def'nitely. I'd rather be an orphan than some of that lot."
To Julie and Mitchie's amazement, Jen and Ros proceeded to get on perfectly the entire afternoon. It was past dark when it finally occurred to the witches they should head back.
"Well, it's been wonderful, Ros. Glad those buggered Dursleys didn't take y' after all," Julie said, hugging her old friend.
"All your doing, guys. Thank you all." And without further ado, Ros gave each girl a hug.
"It was lovely to meet you," Mitchie observed.
"Sometime we must go out and do this again," Jen remarked, a smile incongruous on her bruised face. She and Mitchie stepped outside ahead of Julie and Ros motioned her friend over for a word.
"Yeah, Ros?"
"I know it's not my business, but what happened to Jen?"
"Ex-boyfriend."
"God love her. One fight or abusive?" Julie sighed. "She's so nice, too. Why don't you have that blond professor castrate him?"
"Rosaline!"
"Hey, I call 'em like I see 'em. Thanks again, Jules." They hugged again and Ros saw the new arrival behind Julie. "Why don't you ask him now?"
"Ask who –oh!" It was Draco. "What are you doing here?"
"I've sent the Yank and Blodgett on. I need a word with you."
Ros stepped right up to Malfoy and asked:
"Would you mind terribly unmanning Jen's ex-boyfriend?" To Julie's shock, Draco chortled.
"I know him. It'd take some damn small scissors."
"Julie, I like this guy!" Ros announced. "Well, see you later, it's curfew."
"'Bye!" Julie stepped outside with her professor. No sooner was the door shut than she turned on him. "Now what the bloody hell are you doing here?"
"I needed to talk to you and your mother said you were here."
"Bugger you anyway, Pureblood!" Julie started to stalk off again, but Draco grabbed her shoulder. "What?"
"I…I just wanted to say I was sorry if I offended you."
"Oh, bollocks you offended me, Draco! I don't want to be your little sister, you know! Just 'cause you don't like my mum the way you do my dad doesn't mean I'm not my own person! For God's sake, I didn't even grow up with them!"
Blinded by tears, Julie almost walked directly into oncoming traffic. Draco caught her shoulder again and this time pulled her into a rough embrace.
"I love you for you, Julie, you know that."
"Then why do you keep treating me like a kid?"
"Because I don't want to take away your childhood. I lost mine because of the war and Dad and Voldemort; you've already missed out on most of yours for the same reason. I'll be damned if I take the rest of it."
"Draco…I don't want to be a kid anymore. Kids get hurt."
"And you think you won't when you're older? It just gets worse. And you've only got a few years left to enjoy safety, now that you have it."
"I thought it was because you didn't want to take my dad's daughter away."
"Julie, you dumb Gryffindor, nobody could! You never lose your parents just 'cause you grow up." Draco lifted her chin so she could see his eyes. "I'll wait as long as I have to, but that doesn't mean I'll tie you down while I do it. I love you."
Defeated, Julie buried her face in Draco's chest and held onto him. The difference in their heights was growing smaller, but she was still not quite past his shoulder. It was very strange on Dennon Street at night, black as coal near Broughton, but almost paradisiacally colorful starting three blocks away from the glowing neon tubes and lighted signs of downtown Cobham. They could hear vague music coming from somewhere, and with the curiosity of lovers on a make-up high, they moved southward down Dennon to check it out.
"It's so classy at night," Draco remarked, seeing the nineteen-twenties architecture and brilliant lighting on the shops' and pubs' false fronts. Julie laughed lightly at this opinion.
"You've not been here very long, then, dear." With that enigmatic reply, she pulled him down an alley to the back nine of the street.
It could have not been more different from the elegant fronts than slum Birmingham is from Paris. There were drunks already passed out near the back door of a pub, shadowy men in only trenchcoats or leather jackets despite the cold, and women in too-revealing nylons or fishnets with inhumanly off-season shoes and garish makeup. One of the shadow men slouched toward Julie and she spat out a string of incomprehensible English that made the shadow man back away. Draco looked at her in shock as he realized the man was most likely a Muggle drug-dealer. A garish woman hurried past them, pursued by a man in a worn leisure suit through the slushy snow. She slipped in her stiletto heels and Julie helped her up, only to get a shove from the man as he grabbed the woman by the shoulders and began to yell at her. Draco would have went for him, but Julie stopped him and deftly put snow down the man's back and ran. Ignoring the weeping woman, the man pursued her to the end of the alley, where suddenly he ran into her arm and fell down in the snow. Julie kicked him in the head and he went unconscious.
"Clothesline," she explained to Draco. "Damn pimp." She offered her hand to the woman and helped her up from where she had been shoved again. "Go home," she advised her.
"Thanks, ly-dy," the woman said, scurrying away. Julie took Draco's arm again and together they stepped back across the invisible divide between back nine horrors and stylish fronts.
"She wasn't a-?" Draco asked, unable to say it.
"Hooker? Yep. Don't look so shocked, dear, a lot of the Broughton kids could call 'em Mummy. Where do you think we all come from?"
"You don't," he remarked in some disgust at the situation.
"I didn't always know that, though."
"It was incredibly –Gryffindor of you to do that, though. What if that…"
"Clothesline?"
"Yeah, what if that hadn't knocked him out?"
"It didn't. That's why the kick in the head. I'm a lot more streetwise than book-learned, you know, darling."
Walking again on the sparkling pavements in her tartan coat and black school skirt, snow lit up in colors by the many lights, Julie had transformed into someone who looked not only grown-up, but upper-class. Draco would have never believed her capable of clotheslining a street criminal in a dark alley had he not just seen her do it with his own eyes. "You're staring, have I grown a second head?"
"No, just…changed. Out here you look so much more…is all of this street like that?"
"Like what?"
"Two-sided."
"Oh, yeah, almost all Cobham and a good bit of London is."
"You're just so…used to it all, like this is nothing."
And again, Julie laughed lightly. To her it was nothing. So she explained:
"When I was a kid, I played on this street.
I always loved illusion.
I thought make-believe was truer than life
But now it's all confusion.
Please, can you tell me what's happening?
I just don't know any more.
If this is real, what should I feel?
What should I look for?"
Draco realized what she meant, but wasn't sure what he could tell her.
"If you were smart, you would keep on walking
Out of my life as fast as you can.
I'm not the one you should pin your hopes on.
You're falling for the wrong kind of man.
This is crazy! You know we should call it a day."
"Sound advice," Julie agreed, a little uncertainly.
"Great advice."
"Let's throw it away."
And suddenly, Julie's hands were in Draco's, and she finally
admitted the inevitable. "I can't control all the things I'm feeling.
I haven't got a prayer.
If I'm a fool, well, I'm too much in love to care."
"I knew where I was. I'd given up hope.
Made friends with disillusion.
No one in my life, but I look at you
And now it's all confusion.
I can't control all the things I'm feeling.
I'm floating in mid-air.
I know it's wrong, but I'm too much in love to care."
"I don't think it's wrong."
"You're fifteen," Draco said mildly, a little shocked at what they had just said. Julie merely looked at her watch and smiled.
"Sixteen, actually." He kissed her and they gave up all pretense of hiding it.
"If we are fools, well, we're too much in love to care."
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Jen and Mitchie landed at Hogwarts. Professors Snape and Potter were there in
winter robes to meet them.
"And you left why?" Snape asked in his most malevolent tone.
"Rescuing damsels from Dursleys," Jen replied calmly, even with a touch of humor. Snape's eyes widened for a second. "I don't think House points would be sufficient punishment, shall we say two detentions each?"
"I don't think that's really necessary in view of the circumstances," Snape replied, startling Harry and Mitchie terribly. "Just make certain you get all your work made up and don't cut any more classes."
Not being one to look a gift Snape in the mouth, Mitchie followed inside, explaining the incident to Professor Harry. Jen, however, was stopped at the door by the rarest of rarities; Snape smiling. "It's nice to have you back, Blodgett."
And for some reason, Jen knew he didn't mean from London. It was amazing what two weeks in Gryffindor could do. A thought flickered through her mind, that despite it being Tyler and Snape who had gotten Lyff out of her life, it had been Starcatcher to make her laugh again. Her neck made her head twitch very slightly, but then, she was shivering, so she ignored it. Walking to catch up with Tyler and Professor Potter, it occurred to Jen that Lyff was staring at her whenever she looked at him. Missing her last three classes had been a welcome break from the stress of that.
Dinner was about fifteen minutes' started when Starcatcher got back to them. Jen watched the shorter girl laugh with Tyler and Davies about the whole incident, and realized yet again that she was lovely.
Damn, but she hated Slytherin.
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A/N: Here's an analogy. What Brooklyn is to New York City, Cobham is to the greater London area. Jen comes from a wizarding village not only named for her family but mostly populated by Slytherins. The date of this chapter is on or about January fifteenth, so despite Julie's not knowing her exact birthday, she has always celebrated it mid-month with the Broughton kids. Next chapter: the arrival of Whoever, name and all.