QLFC S3 Round 8
Hugo and Lily are the youngest and so they're always paired together in everything, but the truth is that Hugo doesn't like her very much. Or, no, it isn't quite like that, he thinks. Lily is fine, if a bit energetic. It's just that he just didn't get her at all.
"Hugo! Hugo, guess what happened?" Lily says to him one day while they're shooed to the playground a couple blocks from their houses, her entire body thrumming with excited energy. Her beaming smile takes him aback.
"What?" he asks hesitantly.
"I," she declares, "did accidental magic today!"
"Oh," Hugo says. And then, "That's great, I guess."
"You guess?" she demands. Her entire body is now thrumming with a different kind of energy as she glowers down at him from where she's standing on top the swing. Hugo, sitting idly, knows what was going to happen next. Lily is almost famous for the screaming tantrums she can pull.
She jumps off the swing in one fluid motion and stands in front of him, face dark.
"What do you mean you guess? Why aren't you more excited for me?" She scowls down at him, and he shrugs a shoulder.
"I mean, that's good— great," he corrects. He doesn't say anything more, simply blinks up at her. In moments, he can see her calming down.
"Oh," she says. "That's good then."
Lily settles back down on the swing, and her energetic chatter resumes. Hugo doesn't listen to any of it, but adds in the occasional non-committal hum so she won't get angry again.
"I can't wait to go to Hogwarts," Lily sighs happily. Her eyes sparkle as she looked off somewhere where Hugo can't see. "It'll be so magical."
And there it is. Lily loves magic— loves it from the very bottom of her heart, loves every aspect of it and the world she's immersed in.
Hugo stays silent.
…
Their first year comes too soon and all at once.
They're filled with stories, Hugo and Lily. They know how the candles in the Great Hall shine just as brightly on their first day as on their graduation day. They know how the newly erected memorial stands proudly. They know every professor: have been to every class and lab through parents and siblings and cousins.
It seems to give Lily some kind of life, and she practically glows as she rushes through the barrier, a disorganized mess. Hugo giggles as he sees her hurriedly smooth down her hair and robes, and then quickly lunge for a trunk slipping from her trolley. She laughs at that too, bright and carefree and then says, "Come on, let's get a nice compartment!"
"Lily, wait!"
Hugo hurries and runs with her, because otherwise he'll be left behind. He doesn't get her, but they've always been together, the two of them. Then Lily gets sorted into Slytherin and he gets sorted into Ravenclaw.
And he's okay with this, with Hogwarts, except he never really liked magic in the first place.
(And even later, Lily is just as bright as she was when tumbling into the train station. The glow in her skin, in her eyes hasn't faded one bit.)
He's okay with everything, but this isn't where Hugo wants to be. He's not like Lily. He'll never be like her. He didn't feel that thrill of excitement when sorted. He doesn't gasp in excitement when he sees the devil's root plant in the corner of the greenhouse undulating gently. He doesn't smile at the ceiling every morning in the Great Hall and fall in love with magic all over again.
He wants to go to the muggle world instead.
…
It's second year, and he's wasting time. He should be, could be in muggle school right now, taking mathematics and sciences and learning what he's always wanted to learn, but he's stuck here instead.
At the very end of the school year, Hugo makes his decision. Standing in front of Headmistress McGonagall, Hugo thinks he's maybe gone a little crazy. Taking a deep breath, he says, "I'd like to drop out of Hogwarts."
Her stare is piercing, and Hugo stays still. Behind him, he can hear the portraits start up a frantic flurry of whispering.
Finally, finally:
"Alright."
By noon, everyone at Hogwarts knows the news. For the first time in his school career, he sits alone on the train ride back. Lily passes right by his compartment without looking over, a cold look on her face.
The silence lasts for half the summer before it breaks. Lily's always been too much for her small body to contain. She feels too much, Hugo knows, but he's not sure if that's a good thing or not.
They're back at the swings as she stares angrily ahead, pumping her legs furiously. Hugo watches her go, gently swaying back and forth.
"Why?" she asks.
"Why what?" he asks.
"You know what!" she yells, finally. She turns and glares at him.
Hugo smiles a little ruefully at that. "The world is so much bigger out there," he says. He slows to a stop, brushing the soles of his shoes against the woodchips below. "There are people in space right now. There are people who can cut you open and stitch you right back up with no trouble whatsoever and there are sports; so many more than just Quidditch, open and there for the taking. There are machines that can speak and think and draw."
Lily stays silent.
"The world out there is amazing," Hugo says, looking straight at her. "And I want to go there."
In the morning he's gone to his mum's parents' house, and the world around him settles.