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Chapter 3, Argument with a friend
Inside the car, I moan some affirmative monosyllables as my mother tells me the usual list of advice every time I leave for a friend's house – how I should behave, inside the house, in front of my friend's parents, as if I didn't know Ashley's parents for ages and I were one of those bad-behaved kids who only cause trouble wherever they go – until we finally come to a halt near the front door of Ashley's large house. She may have been waiting for me, because as soon as my mother rings the bell, she opens the door, running to greet me with a warm hug.
"Hi! How are you doing?" she asks happily, her hands on my shoulders, scrutinizing my face as if she found my expression a little weird or unusual. And indeed it is true, as in the corner of my mouth there is a trace of an excited smile I'm trying to suppress. She guesses I have some good news or a new tale to tell and she winks at me, before she turns to greet my mother with a brief handshake.
"Hadn't seen you in a long time, Mrs. Granger," Ashley says, always politely. "I suspect your work has been occupying you terribly, or am I wrong? It is a pity, of course. My mother loves to have a nice tea with you any day."
"Oh, thank you," my mother says, retributing the compliment. "I also appreciate your mother's company, you know." After a short pause, she adds, "Ah well. I am in a hurry right now. Pleased to see you, Ashley." She gives another handshake to my friend and quickly turns back to enter again the car. When it is already far enough so we can't hear its sound, Ashley takes me by the hand and leads me through the path and into the house's entrance. I stop at the threshold as a busy, almost out-of-breath Mrs. Saunders turns to greet me warmly.
"Be welcome, Hermione! How are you doing, sweetheart? I'm sorry for the mess," she says, looking down at her slightly dirty apron, "but it takes a while to take care of this huge house when the maid is ill."
"I'm sorry to hear of that, Mrs Saunders," I say, almost automatically as my mother taught me to. "But it is my pleasure to come to your house." Mrs Saunders smiles gratefully.
"Now if you excuse me, I will go back to work," she announces, and leaves again in the direction of the kitchen, leaving me and my friend alone. Ashley's house is, though in larger scale, organized like mine: the bedrooms are upstairs and the dining and living rooms, along with kitchen, study and other compartments. The stairs that lead to the upper floor are right in front of us; so I look at my friend and she looks at me, and after a short exchange of glances we start to run madly up the stairs and into Ashley's bedroom, probably making so much noise with our feet that Mrs Saunders might have left the kitchen again to see if everything was okay with us.
My friend arrives first and falls into her bed with a sigh. Gasping, I sit in the chair near her desk and put my purse on the table while I try to recover. However, I do not place it the right way as it slides on the slightly inclined desk and falls before I could catch it, spilling its contents all around the floor. Ashley immediately jumps from the bed to help me pick my belongings and when doing so, she immediately notices the large envelope I brought with me.
"So... what do we have here?" she says with an amused look that leaves my intrigued. With a movement of the hand, she puts aside the black curls that had dropped in front of her eyes and scans the addresses in the envelope quickly, her big eyes filled with curiosity.
"I received that letter today, I was going to tell you... it's from a... magic school." Somehow, it is still a bit difficult for me to say these words out loud, though I already have the belief, strong in my mind, that the letter is authentic. Ashley looks up from the envelope and sits again at the edge of her bed. "Really?" she asks, a bit out of curiosity, a bit out of disbelief, her expression a mixture of amazement and doubtfulness.
"Yeah, really," I answer, but not too convincingly. Ashley raises her eyebrows, as if waiting for more, and I gesture to the envelope she holds in her hands. "You can read it by yourself, then... tell me what you think." She opens the envelope almost obediently, reading the letter with the same eagerness that had driven me hours before to do the same. An awkward minute passes while she reads the letter and the enclosed list of materials, each twice before she breaks the silence.
"I... really... don't know what to say," she says slowly, as if thinking each word as she speaks. "Do you believe it is true?"
I nod slowly, a bit afraid of her reaction, as she hasn't stated yet if she shares or not my opinion. "I do," I reply, "because there's not only this." She raises her eyebrows in surprise, possibly waiting for me to pick up yet another letter from nowhere; but I simply tell her of the episode with the owl, which she follows with interest. When I reach the end of it, she laughs, a little nervously, and looks a little bit longer at me, as if scrutinizing my face, trying to find the meaning of this, trying to guess my thoughts, my doubts and beliefs.
"I hope things get more clear after the response from that headmaster," she remarks, and pauses before she continues. "For I certainly don't think this is clear to us as of now."
I know Ashley well enough to know when she is speaking seriously. She starts to use more formal language, as if keeping a distance for safety purposes, and she sits with her back very straight. It would be a fairly good example of an efficient professional. Cold, formal and efficient, that's what she becomes when she's serious about something and doesn't want to get emotionally attached. And I realize this is one of these times, and I can vaguely guess the reason. But before I could say something, she shoots a question at me.
"So what are you going to do if the answer is affirmative? Will you take up this invitation? Give up from your studies?" Maybe she doesn't mean it, but her voice has a touch of bitterness and is directed quite aggressively. I try not to show that I felt it, as I am positive she didn't do it on purpose.
"First of all, it would need a bit of explanation for my parents to agree, but I believe that when everything has been settled, yes, maybe I will try it out." She looks to me and then gazes to the window and outside, where the sun's rays bathe the leaves of the enormous tree in her garden. She has a dreamy expression that I can only identify as thoughtfulness, pondering about questions like 'Why didn't I get this invitation too?', that I'm sure I would have wondered as well had she been the one to receive the acceptance letter.
"You don't have to look so sad," I say, as an attempt to comfort her, "It's not as though I'm leaving for good."
Though it is almost, a voice whispers in my head, For you know your friendship won't be the same. As I try to ignore these thoughts, she speaks of them. "Oh no," she comments, irony obvious in her voice. "Don't you see it's the same? You're my only friend, Hermione. I don't want to go back to the times when I spent my lunch breaks in the library, or had to do all the pair work alone in class."
"I'm sorry," I whisper, uncertain of what to say. "I'm so sorry. But maybe things were meant to be this way... And you don't have to be so pessimistic." I throw a reassuring, comforting look at her before I make a new suggestion. "Maybe... maybe there's a place for you too," I say not too convincingly, almost in an interrogative manner. "It's not as if there's no place for you if there is place for me."
Ashley sighs. "But it is what it looks like, isn't it? Oh my God, Hermione, sometimes you're so naïve!" she says tiredly, as if resigned to an inevitable condition. She gets up on her feet and starts to walk around the room. "They want you, not me. The letter is directed to you. And do you want to know my opinion, honestly?" It seems like a threat is hidden beneath her words, but it annoys me that she is letting her jealousy take over her feelings. However, I try to summon my generosity to stand her offensive words, my patience to convince me that she is out of her mind and isn't doing this on purpose; but she goes on. "I wouldn't want to go there anyway. What do you think this witchcraft business is? Alice's Wonderland? They're probably a bunch of freaks who are sending this to anyone mad enough to believe them!"
As soon as she says these words, I can't stand it any longer, and I feel tears come to my eyes and fall to my cheeks as I am too shocked to worry about keeping them from doing so. The thoughts flow in my mind at the velocity of light, and I start to feel angry, though I make a huge effort not to show it. "I thought you were the only one who understood me and shared my beliefs," I say, trembling. "It is enough that my parents are against it."
"I will not believe in this nonsense," she says affirmatively, her gaze drifting away from me.
I look down. "Anything can be real as long as we believe."
"Nonsense," she repeats again, and then louder. "Nonsense!"
Still looking at my feet, I realize that this matter must not be solved on the moment, as my friend is far too mad to even understand my feelings about this letter. Tears still flow down my cheeks. I never thought I would get on a discussion with Ashley, let alone because of this letter - I thought she shared my views about fantasy. But today it seems she has forgotten about all these worlds we dreamt of together, about all those conversations we had about our future projects. And it saddens me...
As she seems not to react, lost in thought and staring blankly at the outside, I decide to leave. I pick my letter from her bed, where she has placed it, and walk to the door. "I'm sorry," I say in a hoarse voice between sobs, before I close the door of her bedroom behind me and go running down the stairs and out of her house.
A/N: I'm SO SORRY that this chapter took so long! I've just been away from home, and at other times, really busy, so I couldn't write/have access to fanfiction.net, and a big writer block seemed to form.:( I hope this chapter is good though, and I still hope you keep enjoying my story! Big thanks to those who read and/or reviewed the second chapter :) And don't forget to review this one, please!:D
To Zahri Seb Melitor: Revised the sentence you spotted.:) Please tell me if there are places where the story doesn't flow very well, if you can, with suggestions to improve it; it's one of the problems I have due to my short vocabulary (English is not my first language), and I've been trying to improve. :) Thanks in advance. For the zero tolerance policy, I'm not sure if it really exists, but I got that idea from the 'British punctuality' we refer to whenever someone's somewhere on time.:P We Portuguese people aren't too good at being on time either, but I'm happy to say that at my school things work pretty well.:)
To scarlet diamonds: Hope you keep enjoying! I'm glad you liked that scene.:)
To shreve: That is something that will be explained on the last chapters (I'm still not sure how long will be this story). Still, I hope you keep reading and enjoying my story!:)