It's odd how certain events in your past are remembered so clear. I remember it as if it was almost yesterday, and in a way, I wish it were. So many bad things hadn't happened yet. Our connections to the war were purely based on morals. Nameless, faceless people were dying, and no matter how tragic or sad their deaths were, it didn't matter. It didn't affect us. But now it is different. Now it is much more personal. But that day, I remember the light teasing, the playful banter going on about a subject that was so important and huge, but meant almost nothing to us. We were untouched, unaffected, and apathetic. We were saddened, yes, from the tragic deaths of local heroes, but were yet to feel the full impact of the war, of the hate on both sides, of the wrath or Lord Voldemort. We were young, innocent, and far too naive. Now we are still young, but the innocence and naivety have disappeared. We've been forced to grow up in a very cruel way.
CROUCH GRANTS AURORS USE OF UNFORGIVABLE CURSES reads the headline of the paper.
I sigh in disappointment and shake my head at no one in particular. It doesn't make sense. Crouch and the aurors are supposed to be in the good side, yet they keep stooping lower and lower. Soon the good side will be on the same level as the Death Eaters. Soon we too will be killing innocent bystanders so that the "big picture" can be prettier. Soon there will be casualties on our side that haven't been killed by Voldemort.
"What," James asks as he swallows.
How can I explain it? How can I tell him everything that I am feeling? "Oh, nothing."
"You don't approve," he says as more of a statement than a question as he glances over my shoulder to read the paper.
"Uh," I say as I try to think of a way to coherently defend myself without sounding so deficient. I settled on just saying, "No, I don't".
"I knew you wouldn't. Fighting fire with fire is never the right thing to do."
"It's not."
"Of course, we should just sit by and be trampled upon. We should let them destroy our forest with the fire and find a better way than retaliation."
Well, if he wants it to be a fight, "No, we shouldn't just sit back and 'let our forests be destroyed.' The solution to fighting fire is water."
"Water doesn't always work."
"But if you fight fire with fire, then what is left? Fire. Nothing has been fixed. Every side has a weakness. That is how we win. We find their weakness. They found ours. It's the fire."
"But we don't have enough water to win."
"Sure we do. We just haven't figured out how to use it, or where it is all stored, or something James. There has to be a better way."
"Fire is fierce and uncontrolled. Water is slow, patient, and pitiful. The only thing that beats brute force is brute force. It's not going to work."
"That's where you're wrong. We don't have to decline in integrity. We rise, and then we win. We have to. If we don't, then we're proving they have the best way. I can't believe that James. I just, can't. Because, then, James, what are we fighting for, if only to prove that their ways are better than ours?"
Here we are, still very much young, but much more grown up.