Content warning - heads up that this chapter contains references to self harm/possible suicide so may not be suitable for everyone.

Saturday 31 October 2020

In which the narrator passes a most anxious Halloween.

Gone, just like that.

Did she really think that I'd been special? Of all the people in our year, I thought you would do great things. You were always so creative, so polished. It was a cruel joke that she was telling me this now, rather than when it might have done something to lift my spirits. It occurred to me that she might not really have thought I was any good. She probably knew that flattery would be the best way to manipulate me. I found I respected her more for this, although me, less. My hand raked over the scar tissue on my left forearm; I could feel the bumpy texture through the thin cotton lawn of my shirt.

Harry, Ron and I are going back in time. An awful thought struck me. She couldn't mean together, could she? The Time-Turner had not been tested with more than one magical adult, only me; I could not say with certainty that it would work for all three of them. There was a non-zero possibility of serious harm. Granger was as powerful as I was, I thought, and Potter was undeniably a force to be reckoned with. Weasley was the weakest of the three, certainly, but there was no telling who would be most at risk. I could feel a good place with my thumbnail, a bit that would come loose. I gave it an experimental tug.

She was right there. I could have said something. I could have told her not to go back together in a group, not the three of them at once. Take it in turns if you have to, just don't take that risk. What could happen to her. Not a question, I knew exactly, but I didn't want to think about it. And it would be my fault, mine, because I'd had the opportunity to warn her, but I hadn't even thought to because I'd been too distracted by my jealousy of Weasley, the useless prat. I jabbed a bit harder with my thumb, lifting part of the scab away. A few spots of blood appeared on the green paisley of my sleeve. I pulled my right hand away. Bad, bad.

It fascinated me.

I paced around the cell; I felt like a trapped animal. When I'd been working on the Time-Turner, I'd never thought of changing time as anything but morally neutral. Surely it was ridiculously conservative to believe that how stuff happened to have happened was the best and only way? It wasn't as though there was a central, organising force or a grand plan. Wasn't it at least possible to have a better future if you changed the past, not a worse one? But how far back would one need to go to root out the rot?

You're a spoiled brat, a careless person, your sense of entitlement is appalling. You want to break the law, but you don't want to face the consequences. Damn right I don't, I thought.

Perhaps I'd made a mistake in not delving back into my own past. My life had brought mainly pain, death, and misery, for myself and for others. In searching for meaning and happiness I had done unparalleled damage to the universe. If I had gone back and caused myself not to be born, it would almost certainly have been a win for everyone, including me. The world would still be a miserable, corrupt place, I thought, but they would at least have the certainty of a single, true past to cling to like a life raft. I would erase myself, but a brilliant Muggle woman would live, her path failing to cross with the terrified, desperate wizard teenager who would never be born. Complete erasure. Non-being. Bliss.

But it was too late for that. I had not acted while I still could. Both my Time-Turners were gone, but I was still here. I unbuttoned my sleeve and dug my nails into my scar, clawing, tearing. I knew I was doing serious, permanent damage, I knew I was making it worse, but I couldn't stop; it felt so good.

My fingernails broke through into where the curse was contained under the skin. The pain was white hot, searing, glorious.

There was so much blood. It won't stop, I realised in a panic. Oh shit. It won't stop. What have I done?

I pressed my right hand to the wound, trying to staunch it but the blood kept coming. My shirt sleeve was saturated with it now, slick and shining and so so red. My tie, I thought, if I had my tie I could tie it round, get it to stop. But they'd taken my tie, presumably as a precaution in case I tried to kill myself with it. I laughed: the irony. The blood kept coming. My fingers were sticky with it. The smell, the taste of iron was in my mouth.

A memory coming back: a woman screaming, pleading, crying, begging for help, but I was paralysed. I knew what I had to do, but I didn't do it, and would never do it. I had to see it through. Blood all over my shirt, my trousers, splashing on the floor. I couldn't do it. Blood saturating the fabric of my shirt, shiny red but the paisley pattern still visible. I would do it. The floor was getting slippery, my socks were smearing red on the floor. I couldn't bear it. I wrenched my thumbnail through the gushing wound. The pain was incandescent, transcendent and purifying.

I did it.

I felt faint, fuzzy round the edges like a wireless not quite tuned in to a station. My knees were bending of their own accord as I fought to stay upright until I smacked down, falling face forwards onto the cool, hard, tiled floor and knew no more.