[summary] — Cedric&Myrtle [Haunted House!AU] "I have to make sure: you are aware of the … incidents?" she asks carefully. "You mean the deaths?" Cedric blurts out. "The murders and suicides and accidents?"

A/N — It should be noted that Cedric's parents have absolutely no idea what to do for the majority of situations they are presented with in this story. They are very much making things up as they go along. Just in case that isn't obvious :P

And a massive thank you to Ash and Jenny for beta'ing this mess :D

(And Jenny — Theroguehuntress — gets full credit for that last line)

[4800]

"Hello," a woman says, stepping forward. Cedric startles slightly, but relaxes when he realises it's his dad she's addressing. "My name's Bellatrix." She holds out her hand, and Cedric's dad shakes it.

"Yes, we talked on the phone, didn't we?" he asks. "You're the estate agent?"

She smiles, though the twist of her mouth is a little too harsh, a little too cold, to be entirely genuine. Cedric supposes she talks to clients nearly every hour of the day; that the effort of pretending to be happy for them must be a little much. "Yes, that's me." She pulls a set of keys from her pocket. "I must admit, I was a little surprised you wanted to buy the house without seeing it."

His dad gives a self-depreciating laugh that makes Cedric wince. "We're a little … strapped for cash," he says. "This place was cheap."

Bellatrix nods in understanding. "I have to make sure: you are aware of the … incidents?" she asks carefully.

"You mean the deaths?" Cedric blurts out. "The murders and suicides and accidents?"

"Cedric!" his mum yells, slamming the car door and turning the full force of her glare on her son.

"Yes," Bellatrix says, still talking to his father. "The deaths."

"Yes, we, ah —" his dad stutters.

"We know," his mum says, still clearly annoyed, but she softens her voice before continuing. "But that's the only way we could afford a place like this. We don't …"

"No, I understand," Bellatrix says. "It's unfortunate, but yes, it does bring prices down." She opens the door. "Shall we?" Cedric is left wondering why now is the time her smile seems most genuine, while his parents follow her inside.

Briefly, he wonders if he's expected to empty the car, but he pushes the thought from his mind. If that's what they wanted, his mum would have told him at least three times by now. He doesn't particularly want to carry boxes, anyway.

He wanders off down the street, instead.

There's a lot of houses, but the street itself is pretty empty. Cedric assumes everyone must be at work.

A curtain flutters in a window — someone checking up on the new neighbours, presumably — but everything else is still. He makes it to the end of the street without seeing a single person, animal, or even anything to disrupt the stereotypical vision of an ideal neighbourhood.

All gardens were meticulously mown, not a single tree cut into the pavement, and windows were polished to gleaming perfection. The seemingly flawless neighbourhood did more to scare him than the history of his new house.

"Hi." Cedric jumps, a startled noise escaping his mouth before he registers the giggling little girl.

"Hi," Cedric says slowly, trying to calm his erratic heart beat. Where had she come from?

"I'm Ginny," she says, grinning wide enough to show off all her teeth. "I live over there." She pointed behind her, to a strange alley between two of the perfect houses. At the end, he can see an old house with peeling paint; it seems to get wonkier the closer to the top floor it gets, and Cedric is left wondering how it's still standing.

"Really?" he asks, a little doubtful.

"Yep." She grins again. "D'you wanna meet my brothers? They're really annoying."

"Uh ... no, thanks."

She nods, her expression turning serious. "I wouldn't, either."

"Right, well," Cedric says, swallowing thickly, "I have to get home."

"You live there?" she asks; Cedric's never seen anyone look so shocked. She's backing away slowly, shaking her head. "That's the bad house."

He frowns, looking over; it looks exactly like every other house on the street. Yes, the last occupants had died — murder-suicide, according to the news reports his mother had been reading extensively when she thought Cedric couldn't see — but that didn't mean the house was bad. When he turns back to tell her as much, she's gone.

Cedric shrugs, and makes his way back.

His parents are outside when he returns; his mum's glare is definitely annoyed.

"Where were you?" she snaps.

"I was just walking down the street," he says, looking to his dad for help. "I met one of the neighbours."

"Oh?" Bellatrix asks, looking at him with a little too much focus. "Which one?"

"Uh …" Cedric thinks for a moment; he's pretty sure she told him her name, but he can't quite remember it, "a little girl." His mum gives him a disapproving look. "She lives in that weird house. The one that's practically falling down."

"Oh, that's not really this street," Bellatrix says. "That alleyway, it shouldn't be there. It used to be a part of the driveway of one of the houses, but someone knocked through the fence at the end." She looks at his parents earnestly. "It doesn't affect the property values of this street."

His parents both mumble something in agreement; secretly, Cedric thinks they understand property values about as much as he does.

"Well, if that's all?" she asks. "We have another client to see, but not for a couple hours, so I can —"

"Oh, no," his mum says, never one for inconveniencing strangers — no, she saves that for her offspring, Cedric thinks bitterly. "I think we've asked everything we needed to."

"Great," Bellatrix says with what Cedric is now certain is false cheer. "I just need you to sign this," she pulls a clipboard and pen from her bag, handing them to Cedric's dad, "to say I've gone through all the checks, and you agree with everything we discussed."

"Yes, of course," his dad says, signing the paper and handing it to his mum.

"Well," Bellatrix says one they're done, "if you need anything, you've got my number." She shakes both his parents hands. "If you need anything, please don't hesitate to call."

And, with that, she's climbing into her car; a sleek black model that looks more expensive than Cedric would have thought an estate agent could afford. But then, Cedric didn't know how much estate agents made.

.oOo.

Standing in his new room, surrounded by all his possessions packed away in boxes, Cedric thinks he might hate his parents. He knows it's not their fault they lost everything — though the details of which they'd done their best to hide from him — but he still blames them. He doesn't want to be here; he'd had friends, a girlfriend. He'd lived in his old house for his entire life.

Sighing, he opens the first box; his mother had labelled them before he'd started packing, so this one has clothing printed in her neat handwriting, but he hadn't paid much attention to that when he'd been shoving everything wherever it would fit.

He looks down in annoyance, glaring at his old school books as if it's their fault he hadn't bothered to throw them away last year, when he'd moved up from middle school. Instead of taking the box downstairs and admitting to his parents he hadn't actually gone through all his stuff like he was supposed to, Cedric shoves it under his bed.

The next box is a little closer to what he wants; aside from the random mug — after a quick check, Cedric sees the beginning of mould growing inside, so that, too, makes its way under the bed — there's a couple xbox games and a lone book.

He considers opening another box, but instead walks onto the landing and leans over the banister, yelling: "Mum! Can I borrow your charger?"

"Where's yours?" his mum yells back.

"I can't find it!"

"Did you look?" She exits the kitchen wearing rubber gloves and an apron, with her hair tied back — great, she'd probably make him help with cleaning now . The smell of the apple cider vinegar she likes to add to every cleaning product wafts out behind her, making his eyes water a little.

"Yeah."

She sighs, but she looks too tired to properly scold him. "You can borrow your dad's. My phone's charging."

"Thanks, Mum." Cedric grins, bounding down the stairs and ignoring his mum's yell of, "No running in the house!"

.oOo.

Howling winds tear through the room, sounding more like screams. Like hundreds of voices coming together, all saying the same thing but too out of sync to be able to discern their words.

Hands, gripping, pulling, clawing.

A figure materialises, features indistinguishable, looking more like mist in the vague shape of a person. Shaking, flickering in and out of view.

Surprisingly clear eyes staring, unblinking. A gash opens beneath the eyes, where a mouth should be, gaping. Where there should be lips, teeth, tongue, there is nothing; a black so dark it hurts to look at.

The wind picks up, inside now, whirling in visible lines through the room, picking up anything in its way. The figure remains unaffected.

The mouth twists up into a mockery of a grin, moving as if to form words, but the shapes are indistinct.

.oOo.

Cedric wakes up in a cold sweat, though his dream slips from his mind too fast for him to remember why his heart is pounding.

"Cedric!" his mum yells, sounding irritated enough that Cedric assumes she'd been calling for a while. "Breakfast!"

Cedric groans, rolling out of bed and pulling on his shirt and jeans from the day before. His stumbling journey to the door ends abruptly in muffled swearing when he steps on something sharp. Pain shoots through his foot, and he only realises what caused it when he's about to step on it again.

Pottery shards.

He could've sworn he left that mug under the bed, but maybe he'd just put it to the side.

Hobbling into the bathroom and leaving the occasional spot of blood on the tan carpet of the landing, Cedric grabs some toilet roll and wraps it around his foot before limping down the stairs.

"What on earth have you done?" his mum asks as soon as she sees him, setting three empty bowls on the table and ushering Cedric into a chair.

"Broke a mug," he mutters.

"And what was a mug doing in your room?"

Cedric just shrugs, and asks: "Where's Dad?"

"We don't have any food," his mum says, searching through some boxes and pulling out an old first aid kit on only the second try.

Cedric knows better than to ask why he'd been called down for breakfast when there wasn't any food in the house. It had never ended well for him in the past.

His mum pulls some tweezers out and Cedric yanks back his foot. "It's fine, Mum."

"Let me at least check," she says, procuring her glasses from god only knew where and leaning uncomfortably close to Cedric's foot.

The front door slams shut.

"What's going on?" Cedric's dad asks.

"Where's the food?" is Cedric's mum's reply.

Cedric's dad frowns, holding up a pint of semi-skimmed milk. "I thought this was all you wanted?"

His mum looks horrified — more so than when she'd first seen the cut on the bottom of his foot, Cedric thinks a little sulkily — but at least she's put the tweezers down.

After a moment of stony glaring, his mum sighs. "Well, I think we still have some cereal somewhere," she says.

By that, it turns out, she means they have a box of Special K that's been open long enough to taste like cardboard as soon as milk is added, that she'd already put away in one of the kitchen cabinets.

.oOo.

Cedric's mum had forced him to spend the entire day helping to unpack — his dad had given him a shrug in apology (though he hadn't seemed overly sorry) and left for work soon after breakfast — so Cedric was exhausted by the time dinner rolled around.

And he still hasn't managed to find his xbox.

They order take-out again; Dominos this time, so Cedric's waiting by the door because he's been craving garlic bread for weeks now.

The doorbell rings; it's the first time they've heard it.

It's … unusual, to say the least. There's no set tune, but it's high and grating and sets his heart racing, though he isn't sure why.

The door sticks when he tries to open it, the handle refusing to turn.

"Mum!" he calls. "Did you lock the door?"

"No," she says as she leaves the kitchen, gracing him with the look. When she turns the handle and the door opens instantly, the look intensifies.

.oOo.

The figure is gone.

Relief is only momentary; the room is empty, but it feels full, as if a thousand eyes lurk in the shadows to watch in secret.

They are waiting.

.oOo.

His mum grabs his foot, unwrapping the bandage and peeling off the absorbent pad with little attempt at decent bedside manner. She makes a disapproving cluck of her tongue. "Honestly, Cedric," she says, "what have you been doing?"

"Nothing!" he defends himself quickly. And then, much more hesitantly, adds: "Why?"

"I don't see how it could've —" she pauses, visibly thinking. "Did you wash it before bed?"

"Why?" Cedric repeats.

"To clean it!" She's rummaging through the first aid kit as she speaks, pulling out the chalky spray that Cedric hates. Apparently, it's supposed to help with healing cuts. Pain relief or something. "Didn't you wash it in the shower?" She looks up when he doesn't reply, exclaiming "Cedric!" at his blank look.

He gets the feeling she's about to start in on her usual rant — variations of "We did not raise you like this!" and "Why is this how you thank us for all we've done?" — so Cedric asks: "Can I go out today?"

"And do what?" she asks. "With who? We still have a lot of unpacking to do."

Cedric shrugs. "I just wanted to look around."

"With who?" his mum repeats.

"No one," Cedric snaps, suddenly feeling anger clawing at his chest. "I have no friends. You made me leave them all, remember?"

"You —" His mum opens and closes her mouth for a few seconds, looking a little lost. "As long as you stay on the street. And don't stay out long." Cedric hisses in a sharp breath as she sprays the small cannister on his foot. It turns to liquid as it hits his skin, fizzing until it turns a chalky white that he knows from experience will flake off as soon as he touches it.

Secretly, he thinks his mum just sprays too much of it.

"So I can go now?" he asks, hoping she'll take his calmer tone as the apology he doesn't want to utter.

"Sure," she says.

.oOo.

The street's a little less empty now than it had been two days before.

The little girl's out again, but this time she's with two slightly older boys. He assumes their her older brothers.

Upon seeing him, the oldest of her brothers steps forward, asking: "Who're you?"

The girl glares. "I told you! I met him the other day."

"Shut up, Ginny," the younger of the two boys says, earning him a slap on the arm from his sister and a, "You shut up!" in return.

"Both of you shut up!" the older boy snaps. Then, to Cedric, he asks: "You moved into the house?"

Ginny nods seriously. "He lives in the bad house."

"Uh …" Cedric stammers, "I just moved in, yeah." He gestures in the vague direction of his house, though it looks exactly the same as the houses on either side. "My name's Cedric."

"I'm Fred," the boy says, "'n this is Ronnikins." He pushes the younger boy forward, who shoots his brother a glare.

"He's George," the boy says. "And my name's Ron."

"Right," Cedric says. "Okay. Well … it's nice to meet you." It sounds a little more like a question than he thinks it should, but it's something his parents say a lot. They all stare at him expectantly. "Why's my house bad?" he blurts out for want of anything else to say when the silence becomes a little too creepy.

"It's the bad house," Ginny repeats. "Bad things happen there."

"People die," Fred or George says — Cedric hasn't decided which brother he believes yet.

"It's haunted," Ron adds. Fred. He believes the boy's name's Fred. Ron's either a liar or insane.

"There's no such thing as ghosts," Cedric says as reasonably as he can manage. It probably sounds really patronising, but … there's no such thing as ghosts!

"Are too!" Ginny says.

"I've never seen any."

"That's 'cause they're all in your house," Ron mutters petulantly.

"They're not," Cedric says, "because ghosts don't exist."

With a muttered, "Goodbye", Cedric turns to leave. His mum had told him not to stay out long, and his foot was starting to hurt; it had nothing to do with the fact that he thought he might lose this argument. He'll wait until he starts school to try and make friends.

"Ron! Ginny!" a woman's voice yells as he's halfway down the street. "George! Inside!"

.oOo.

"Are ghosts real?" Cedric asks.

His mum scowls and says, "Is this really appropriate conversation for the dinner table?" at the same time as his dad says, "That really depends on what you mean by ghosts."

So, Cedric decides to ignore his mum and answers his dad: "Like … dead people. Coming back." He pauses, then adds: "As ghosts."

His dad takes a moment to think about it, which Cedric appreciates. Most adults — his mum included — tend to brush off questions that are difficult to answer. "Well … people have souls, or spirits," his dad says slowly. "So … I suppose it's reasonable to assume they might leave a … presence, an imprint, on the world."

So, basically, he doesn't know. But at least he'd tried to answer. Cedric nods anyway, and says, "Thanks, Dad," as he tucks into his food and lets the subject drop, much to his mum's relief.

.oOo.

The figure is closer now, the flickering faster, and exuding anger.

It's mouth opens in wordless, soundless, screams.

A dull thud, something scrapes across the floor — something is dragged across the floor, the ratatattat of something sharp on the wooden floor.

The vague shape of a hand, fingers extending and bending at unnatural angles, creeps over the edge of the bed.

Fingers flutter over an ankle, somehow both cold and burning hot.

Sharp nails dig into parted flesh —

.oOo.

Cedric awakes with a scream, pain radiating from the sole of his foot and shooting all the way up his calf, stopping just below his knee. He doesn't know when he started crying, but tears and snot are streaming down his face, his eyes already swollen.

He hears the pounding of feet on the landing, something slamming into his door.

"Cedric!" his mum yells. "Cedric, what is it? Open the door!"

"Cedric, you need to move," his dad adds. Cedric doesn't understand; he's in his bed. But the pain is all he can think of, so much so that he can't even try to form words.

Through the haze his mind has become, he vaguely registers a muffled conversation between his parents, and someone walking away with hurried steps.

The next thing he notices, the door is falling to the floor, hinges removed.

"Cedric, what happened?" his mum asks, running over. If he weren't feeling so bad, Cedric might have noticed that he'd never seen either of his parents look so terrified.

Something cold and wet is wrapped around his leg, and fingers card through his hair. He flinches away from the tough, but the fingers are gentle and it's nothing like the prying, clawing grip of the night before. He leans into the hand.

Wet drips down his calf, dampening the sheets beneath him. Though that could partially be sweat; Cedric can't tell.

Eventually, the pain dulls down enough for him to blink his eyes back into focus.

His parents look worried as they mutter quiet words to each other.

— hospital?" his mum finishes.

His dad shakes his head, saying: "It's going down … whatever it is. We can probably just book a doctor's appointment." His dad pauses, and then adds: "I don't think it's hurting him so much now."

Cedric finds himself drifting off into a thankfully dreamless sleep.

.oOo.

"Oh, you're awake," his mum says, after she's finished shaking him to ensure that he was awake. Instead of replying, Cedric simply groans. "The girl from down the street came for a visit," his mum continues, "but she didn't want to come upstairs." She pauses. "Wouldn't come inside at all, actually."

"Ginny?" he croaks. "Why was she here?"

"No, not Ginny. Unless that was her friend," his mum says. "Her name was Luna." She sets something down on his bedside table. "She asked me to give you this, and said another girl would be visiting later."

Cedric glances over, curiosity piqued, and sees a single daisy floating in what looks like a miniature fishbowl half-filled with water.

His mum sees him looking, and says, "She brought it 'round like that. Didn't want me to take it out." His mum frowns slightly. "She didn't seem too bothered that it'll probably die soon."

"Who's coming later?" Cedric asks.

"Oh, um … Luna said her name was … Myrtle, I think? Though she said she'd be around tonight, which seems a bit late, but —"

Cedric tunes her out.

.oOo.

The figure prowls closer. Tonight, it seems excited.

There is no clawing or scratching, no wordless screams, and the sense of fear it causes is muted.

It's waiting.

.oOo.

"No, back to bed!" Cedric's mum says as soon as she sees him.

She's ushering him back into his room before he can protest, and it's only when she's tucking his duvet around him that he thinks to say: "But, Mum, I'm hungry."

"I'll bring you up some food."

Cedric would protest, but he's not normally allowed food in his room.

"Can I go see Luna later?" he asks. He doesn't want to tell his mum he has no idea who she is — that would be the fastest way to never find out — but he has a horrible feeling he knows who Myrtle might be, and he's sure Luna would be able to shed some light on that.

"No, honey," she says. "I'm sorry, not today." He can't stop the disappointment from showing on his face. "When your leg's healed up."

"Okay," he mutters dejectedly.

"We'll see what your doctor says," she concedes with a sympathetic smile. "Now, what did you want for breakfast?"

Cedric thinks for a moment. "Pancakes."

He gets toast. Though the generous spread of Nutella helps to make up for it — only hindered because he now knows she's hiding Nutella somewhere in the house.

.oOo.

It's late afternoon, and he's spent the majority of the day falling in and out of a light doze, before he finally feels brave enough to take a look at his leg.

Lifting the duvet slowly, he tilts his head down hesitantly and —

He lets out a sound which can only be described as a shriek and quickly pulls the covers back over, wincing as it tugs at his skin.

There are … veins covering his legs, black lines like spiderwebs, fanning out from underneath his foot. They get thinner the further up his leg they go, and are completely gone just below his knee, but they're there and they shouldn't be.

"Mu-um!" he yells, though his voice is a lot squeakier then he had intended.

She runs in fast enough that he thinks she must have been waiting for him to call her. One look at his face — which he knows must be looking borderline hysterical, if the way he's feeling is anything to go by — and she relaxes.

"I know, sweetie," she says. "We've booked a doctor's appointment. Everything's going to be okay."

Cedric nods, leaning back against the mound of pillows propping him up, and his mother turns to leave.

"Try to rest some more."

"Yeah, okay," he says. She pulls the door to behind her — it would be too much to ask her to actually close it properly — and he waits a few minutes after he hears her head down stairs before throwing the duvet off again.

He stumbles to his feet, feeling all the blood rush to his head, and having to pause and overcome the sudden wave of dizziness before he can limp to the window.

He pulls the latch open, wincing at the noise it makes — logically, he knows his mum won't be able to hear it, but he still waits a moment before throwing his leg over.

The landing is more painful than he'd anticipated. He lands on the grass, sure enough, but his legs give out beneath him, and the cuts on the sole of his foot send shooting pains all the way up to his thigh.

He's just struggling back to his feet when a soft voice asks: "Are you okay?"

There's a girl — about Ginny's age, he thinks, or possibly a bit younger — staring at him with wide, clear eyes. Her face is oddly blank, but somehow still very attentive; like she's taking in a lot more than most people would.

"I'm fine," he says, finally gaining his footing and turning to face her properly.

"Okay," she says. "It's just that you fell pretty far."

"I meant to do that."

"Oh." She stands watching him for a while, not offering anything more to the conversation.

"Are you Luna?" Her grin is so wide, Cedric can see all her teeth; on anyone else, it would look vaguely predatory, he thinks, but on her it just looks … ecstatically happy.

"Yes," she says, as if her expression hadn't been confirmation enough. "I was waiting for you."

"You knew I'd be here?" he asks.

There's a pause in which Luna doesn't look uncertain so much as concerned. "You live here."

"Well, yes, I — yes,' he stutters. "You came here yesterday," he says eventually.

"Yes."

"Er … why?"

"To see you," she says. "You were hurt."

"But … how'd you know that?"

"Myrtle told me," she says as though it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"And Myrtle is …"

"You've met Myrtle," Luna says. "She likes you."

"Cedric!" his mum yells. Cedric turns slowly to see her standing in the front doorway, bin bag in one hand, and looking absolutely furious. "I told you to rest!"

"Sorry, Mum," Cedric mutters, eyes downcast, and turns, the pain travelling further up, past his hip and crossing over to the other side of his body. Maybe this had been a bad idea.

Just before he limps back inside, Luna says brightly: "It was lovely to meet you. Myrtle says you're going to be staying for a long time."

.oOo.

"Well, you're definitely grounded," Cedric's mum says in a deceptively calm tone. "What were you thinking?" She angrily tucks the duvet around him. "Look at you, you're shaking!" She pauses, then repeats, quieter: "You're shaking."

"Mum —"

Her expression clouds over with worry. "I'll be right back," she says.

.oOo.

The figure leans over the bed, inches away. And grins. Its mouth stretching to unnatural proportions, almost cutting the vague shape of a face in half.

Twisting into something that's almost a grin, the figure speaks in a voice that's surprisingly high-pitched — surprisingly childish and innocent — and says: "We've been waiting a long time for you to join us."

...oOo…

Bellatrix steps from the car. She raises her tone a few octaves higher, her voice sounding sickly sweet to her own ears, and says: "Hello." She holds out a hand, aiming for professional reassurance. "You must be Mrs. Creevey."

"Yes, I — yes," the woman stutters, but gives Bellatrix a genuinely warm smile. Good. This was always easier when they were comfortable.

"I'm glad you're still interested in the house," she says, "especially after … after what just happened." She tries to look sorrowful, though she's not quite sure if she achieves it. She'd made a lot of money from the Diggorys, after all.

"Well, it's not like we could turn down such a cheap price," Mrs. Creevey says with a self-depreciating laugh. Bellatrix knew her target audience; if you lowered the price of a house enough, the desperate wouldn't even hesitate at the circumstances.

"If you don't mind me asking," Mrs. Creevey says, "what happened to the family that lived here? I know they died, but ..."

"The Diggorys, they … their son was ill," she lies. "And when he died, the parents … well, it was all very unfortunate, really." She smiles. "But don't worry … I'm sure you'll be perfectly fine."