The summer soon began to wear on Marilyn, and her daily countdown felt like it had slowed to a crawl. It was bound to happen, wasn't it? However independent she fancied herself, everybody needed some sort of positive interaction every now and then, and her life at home - if it could even be called that - consisted of keeping her mouth shut to avoid snide remarks from turning into screaming matches, and just…getting by. Things hadn't always been easy at Hogwarts, but at least most of the problems could be solved by honest conversations, and there was always some sort of laugh or another inbetween. There wasn't much laughter here. There wasn't much anything, other than clinging to the self control it took to not react to anything - because she'd only regret it the second she did - and devising ways to stay out of the house as much as humanly possible.

It was no way to live, though. It wasn't even much of a way to exist. She was lonely - she was tired, and she felt lost. And she would later tell herself that all of this was why, when the letter came bearing painfully familiar handwriting, she opened it rather than flinging it into the bin. Albeit after a good half hour of staring at it distrustfully. It had arrived just after she'd snuck into the house, which was a feat of decent timing, and - more curiously still - the owl hung around after she took the letter, as though expecting a swift reply. Maybe it wasn't full of derision and insults then. Or maybe Draco just knew her well enough to know that if it was, it still wouldn't go unanswered. It especially wouldn't, even.

Even if it had arrived during the time she'd been avoiding the house, though, letters were one thing her mother would never poke her nose into - fearful of magic and whatever booby-traps might be set upon the envelope, should anybody other than the recipient try to open it. It wasn't a fear that Marilyn made any effort to discourage. Maybe it was even an apt one, given this particular letter. Sighing, she kicked her trainers off and sat down onto the bed cross-legged. Then, with an air of finality, she cracked the emerald green, snake-laden seal. The very familiar bracelet fell out with a soft metallic hiss, landing in her lap. Marilyn paid it no mind, turning to how the letter began.

B,

She, valiantly, took 'B' to mean Baxter, and not "Bitch", nor…oh, "Bloodmud" or something like that. Reading on, she found herself surprised at the length of the paragraph. Anything more than two words was surprising, really.

Take it. It was meant for you, and I've no use for it - nor the space. It's bad manners to return a gift like that, you know. I'm returning it to you for your birthday. Do with it what you will. It's not cursed, either, before you get all paranoid. Reply or don't. But if you do, use a false name. Although I suppose you won't be allowed if you're with the Weasley troupe of clowns already.

Anyway, it's yours. As I said. I don't care what you do with it.

D. M.

P.S. Is your summer shaping up to be as insufferable as mind?

Marilyn laughed. She couldn't help it. And then the laugh morphed into a weird, strangled half-giggle, half-sob. He really was an unbelievable little arsehole. Well, strictly speaking he had a good few inches on her in terms of height, but still. Only Draco Malfoy, after all they'd been through, would pen a letter to her trying to break the ice by insulting her manners, and then moaning about his lot in life. Then she was at her desk with a quill in hand much more quickly than she'd ever admit, should she find herself with cause to tell this story. The worst part being how much bloody easier it was to write than any of those she'd sent to George and Hermione so far this summer.

Doc Marten,

Fine. I'll look up etiquette teachers and find out the best way to deal with gifts from somebody who hates your guts. Paranoia? In a time like this? Unheard of, truly. By the way, totally unrelated, have you seen the newspaper headlines about all of the disappearances lately? Strange, that.

Sighing, she leaned back in her chair, turning her eyes to his letter as it sat beside her own piece of parchment. Then she took up her quill again, lips twisted together tightly as she wrote on.

Turns out I won't be visiting the Weasleys this summer, or at all, so no worries. No rules to follow there.

Meryl Monroe

P.S. I'm willing to bet you one silver bracelet that my summer is going worse.

For a moment she considered rewriting the letter - taking out any reference to the Weasleys, or at least making it sound a bit less…well, pissed off. But she was pissed off. And though she knew she'd feel guilty for it if it turned out they really were having some sort of horrendous family emergency that made writing a normal letter impossible - and that said affliction had somehow also spread to Hermione - she just…doubted it. It was too coincidental, too, that George and Hermione should both simultaneously start treating her the exact same way at the exact same time. Maybe she was paranoid, for her mind was growing good at conjuring up images of the two of them - more, when Harry, Ron, and George were added to the mix - discussing her and coming to the conclusion to slowly distance. It didn't seem like something they would do, but she couldn't think of any other explanation.

She knew bullshit when she smelled it, and she knew when she wasn't wanted, when she was expendable, and when she was being pushed away. Hell, she was feeling that a lot around here, now more than ever. She'd grown up entrenched in that feeling, and she knew it when she felt it. And this was that. She also felt bloody stupid for not expecting it. For telling herself the Gryffindors weren't like that. Everybody was like that, when the conditions were right. At least Draco didn't pretend otherwise.

God, she sounded pathetic. Even in her own mind. Defeatist, needy, and pathetic. The summer was grinding her down.

But, that being said, it wasn't emanating from Draco's letter. No, he might've been desperately trying to pretend so, but it wasn't the case. The hints weren't exactly subtle - instructions on how she should reply, and even a question at the end, implying the expectation of a reply. Or at least the invitation of one. He just had to act like he didn't want one - like it meant little to him - in case she didn't, so then his pride wouldn't be wounded.

And he'd remembered her birthday. From someone like Draco, that was a lot.

Then, of course, that thought had her feeling even worse. Because was she really turning into one of those girls who applauded their shitty lads for basic decency? Wow, he remembered my birthday and didn't call me a filthy little mudblood, isn't he so very good?

But she missed him. She was tired, and she was sad, and she needed something good, and all she could remember was the good. Especially on evenings like this, when she could map out exactly where the two of them had been a handful of months prior, lounging on that massive green sofa, annoying one another for fun.

Sighing, she sealed her envelope (he'd have to brave a sellotape seal, for she didn't have any fancy wax ones at her own disposal), and tied it to the foot of the owl. Said owl had been treated to a bowl of dry cornflakes while she'd written - the best she had, under a need to improvise. While Marilyn had no owl of her own - she could hardly look after one here - York was home to a decent little magical hub, namely a handful of very small businesses offering to rent out owls, and to transfer pounds to galleons, and she knew she'd be able to borrow an owl from there if need be. It was how she'd been able to write to George and Hermione, but that would take time (she certainly wasn't going to go traipsing there tonight), as well as galleons, and if she gave it time, she'd probably start to think better of replying. She didn't want to think better of replying. She just wanted somebody to talk to.

As the bird departed with the letter, she returned to her bed and took up the bracelet from where it lay amongst her covers. She didn't put it on. Even for her current spell of stupidity, that would be too much. But she held it up, twirling it this way and that so she could watch it glimmer against the light that came in from the street lamps outside. Maybe she'd regret this in time. In fact, she knew she would. She'd been here before, this ground was stupidly familiar, and she was taking idiocy to a new level by straying down this path again and expecting it to lead somewhere new.

But it eased the ache that being here set within her. And, here and now at least, that made it feel worth it.

George stared glumly at the ceiling of the bedroom he and his twin shared in Grimmauld Place. There was a damp patch on it, and before they'd moved in there had been something worryingly resembling black mould growing on the window panes. Apt, considering the House of Black had once lived here, but still not too healthy. His mind wasn't on it now, as it had long been Scourgify-ed from the glass.

"Been a while since you got a letter," Fred commented from his bed a few feet away.

All of their mail still went to the Burrow, considering that having all of their letters addressed to a top secret hideout would probably made said top secret hideout less…er…top secret. Their parents would routinely dip out to collect it and make the house appear a bit more lived in to ease any suspicions. Up until recently, there had always been one for George. Now? Now there hadn't been anything in a while.

At first he'd been relieved by that, too. Keeping up a ruse for a bit of mischief was one thing, but consistently lying to a friend for reasons they could not yet appreciate was another. A friend who was clearly struggling, based on the changing tone of her letters as time went on - the humour and the cheer draining from them more and more as they went on, until they became the sort of thing his mum would force him to send to extended family at Christmas. It was nice to no longer see the letter and dread the process of working out how to give her the brush off without, well, making it sound like he was giving her the brush off.

The relief soon turned to worry, though, as he realised that at least the existence of the letters proved that she was basically okay. Now there was none of that. Before, he'd wondered if the more and more distant tone of the letters was personal, or a reflection of what was going on at home - where she was now stuck. Talk about shite timing. Now he had to wonder the same thing about the lack of letters, although he'd guess it was a mix of both. A girl like Marilyn would only tolerate being held at arm's length for so long before she took the hint. Proud, that one. Ordinarily he'd view it as a good trait in someone, but now the whole thing was embittered by the fact that it wasn't a hint he'd wanted to give. He just didn't have a lot of choice in the matter.

"Yeah," George muttered "It has. Wonder if she's okay."

"If anybody out there is doing okay, it's Marilyn Baxter."

"She never told you much about her home."

"But she gave you all the gory details, did she?"

"Not details, no. But she told me enough. Sounds like she's in the same mess as Harry is with the Dursleys."

"Doesn't make a stellar case for Muggle parenting, does it?"

"Steady on, Malfoy."

"Fitting you should say that, really, considering this is his fault. Baxter's too, to an extent. I like her, but it's true."

George sighed "I wish Granger hadn't told them all about it."

"I'm glad she did."

"Fred…"

"If it comes between Marilyn Baxter having a nice summer, and us beating You-Know-Who in this…whatever's to come," George noted ruefully how his brother avoided the word war "I think I'll have to go with the second. I don't like it either - really, I don't, and I hope she's okay, and she's probably very annoyed with us right now, and maybe we even deserve it, but if she knew, she'd understand."

"But she doesn't know. What she does know is that her supposed friends have left her to deal with…with that all summer, after promising an escape from it."

"If we can't even reach out and talk to Harry himself, we can't argue her case. I don't like it either, Georgie, but can you honestly say you'd ever be able to live with yourself if we lost people here because we knowingly invited a girl who carries on with Draco Malfoy here?"

"She doesn't anymore. And she wouldn't betray us to him."

"I reckon Sirius and Remus thought the same about Peter Pettigrew once."

Which was probably why Sirius had been the most resounding voice in refusing to even consider allowing Marilyn to come here. Given that the house was his, the matter was settled after that, even if the rest of the Order hadn't resoundingly agreed.

"They all discussed it - the whole Order," George commented quietly.

The decision to ban them from telling Marilyn much of anything was a pretty unanimous one, the variety mostly lying in how much any of them had enjoyed making said decision. Their mum had liked it least of all.

"My boys told me she didn't get a single letter from home that whole school year, you know. Not one. Even those Muggles send Harry something at Christmas. Not anything worth having, right enough, but…"

"Take it from somebody who knows, Molly, having nasty parents doesn't automatically mean we go about cavorting with Death Eaters and blood purists," Sirius had responded flatly "It's no excuse."

"She's only a girl, Sirius."

"And I was only a boy. One born into it, no less. I managed to wash my hands of it. As I said, no excuse."

One voice, George had noted, was very silent throughout the whole debate.

"I know they did. We listened in together," Fred replied.

"No, the…the whole Order. Snape was there."

A beat of silence, and then a soft "Shit."

"S'pose it's just another reason to hope he's as trustworthy as Dumbledore says," George murmured grimly "Else there's no way he'll keep his mouth shut about this while he's rubbing shoulders with that lot."