Seeing the Past, Present, and Future
Odd Relatives
The young Gryffindorsat on her crimson-sheeted bed and started picking off tiny pieces of lint. She supposed she ought to have been a bit nicer to Hermione but she didn't really like thinking about her uncle. The last time she'd seen him was when she was five, but she still remembered him well. He had light, reddish-brown hair and was slightly balding at 39. She remembered that whenever she saw him he was always wearing the exact same outfit: a pair of ironed khaki pants and a white button-down shirt. When she was even younger she had thought that his entire closet was filled with matching outfits like that. He had a rather tall and lanky figure, even taller then her father, and warm brown eyes that always looked like he was smiling. Somehow she had always known something was…different about him. Call it an aura thing. Once she had shown signs of her magic, at about 4 her father told her, he had started showing her tricks. Her favorite was when he took a tea cup and turned it into a snail. She'd always try to keep the snail as a pet, feeding it lettuce and dripping water into the container she kept it in, but it never lasted long. Once, when performing the spell, he had slipped and the snail had had the most beautiful shell, the exact same pattern as on the tea cup it had came from. Every time her Uncle Adoni came over she begged him to show her the magic tea cup/snail trick. Her father always joked that soon there would be no tea cups left for them to drink tea from.
He had given her the pendant she was currently wearing on her fifth birthday. It had come in a small dark blue box and she remembered instantly thinking how beautiful, how fragile it was. Even her five-year old mind had been able to grasp that this was something to be careful with.
"Is it magical?" her father asked, looking at it suspiciously.
Uncle Adoni looked away. "Well, yes, but not obviously so. And if she tucks it in her shirt it won't be noticeable. Shrinking charm," he added.
"What's it do?" I hear my five-year old's voice.
"It protects you and it shall hopefully always be a reminder that someone--" here he had touched my nose and I had giggled "will always love you."
"Thank you, Uncle Adoni," I had said, hugging him. "Will you help me put it on?"
"Sure," he said clasping the long necklace around my small neck.
My father still looked hesitant. "I don't know, Adoni…it's like broadcasting magic to the whole world, and…that's not exactly a good idea."
"Don't worry, look, even now you can't see it."
"Even so…"
"No one's going to go around checking people's necklaces. Well, this is really more of a pendant, but even so."
"I suppose…but d'you really think it's safe for her to wear?"
"I wouldn't have given to her if I didn't think so."
"Will it really protect her?"
"That's what the person said. I'm not really sure how it works, though."
"Do you like it?" Daddy said, directing his attention to me.
I nodded, a smile on my face. And you really couldn't see it when it was hidden beneath my clothing.
Daddy smiled back and I vaguely remembered, somehow, that he had smiled more before Mommy had left. But those were the half formed memories of a child, and somehow I wasn't even sure if they were anything more than mere dreams I'd had, they seemed so distant.
A year later, at my sixth birthday party, Daddy smiled even less. It was just us now. His other brother, Uncle Geordi, I think his name was, had long stopped associating with us. I had only a very vague memory of a rather large man who smelled of cigars and had a small mustache. I had never met my Grandparents either, or rather, I had only seen them once, when I was a year old. And I somehow I knew without asking that my favorite uncle, my only uncle really, would not be coming. I think at that age, age six, I was still a bit too young to fully understand what had happened to my Uncle Adoni. I knew it had something to do with the evening my father cried and cried, and somehow I knew I wouldn't be seeing him at my sixth birthday party. I don't think I grasped the forever part, though, the forever that I would never again see that kindly smiling face except in my dreams. I'm still not sure if I really understand the concept of forever. But I know what death is now, oh do I know what death is. I didn't go to Uncle Adoni's funeral; I don't think he even had one.
Once I turned six, Daddy started home schooling me. He taught me to read first so when he was at work I could read short stories he would buy or write for me. I never really thought about why I wasn't at a school with other children, I just knew I wasn't. I also never really understood why I didn't have a mother anymore, I just knew she had left me and she wasn't planning on coming back. I thought it had something to do with Uncle Adoni, she'd never really liked him, and something to do with that window I broke when I was mad. I hadn't actually touched the window, and I hadn't thrown anything threw it, either. All I knew was that somehow it had broken and that had made me different, a different which made Uncle Adoni's eyes sparkle as he showed me wonderful magic tricks, far greater than the old "coin behind the ear."
Another Gryffindor first year looked up. She thought she had heard the sound of someone crying. She shrugged and continued to read her magazine before deciding to go the common room to say hello to her friends.
A/N: Okay, I know this chapter is a bit different (fine, really different) and I'd really like to hear your opinions on it (but flames still aren't appreciated). The next chapter should be back to the normal style, I just wanted to give you a glimpse into—part—of her mind. Oh, and in case it isn't obvious, the italics are her thoughts in the first person so "I" is our mysterious friend.
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or his world.
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