A Stranger's Life Series. Based on Alastor Moody.
1. What They Don't Know.
2. Title: In Children's Eyes.
Rating:
Pairing: AM/KS
Summary: Second in the 'A Stranger's Life' Series.
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There are specks of white lint lying on his grey vest.
It's an old vest that's seen much better days… The old threads are falling out of place. It was once a deep blue but now a faded out grey.
"Are you ready?" He's a man of a big stature. His broad chest is strong and his shoulders allow him to seem invincible.
The older man with the one leg sits on the bed.
"Help me with these damned buttons."
The big strong fingers take over where the older parchment white and wrinkly ones had been.
A quick kiss on the lips.
"Come on, let's hurry."
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When he's about 5 years old he noticed a problem with his family. Unlike everyone around them, his parents were always after the 'smelly stuff'… his Mommy would try to kiss him but she would lose her balance and fall to the floor laughing.
His father would throw his oldest sister up in the air and then forget her as she came down.
But they weren't mean like some of the parents. The ones that would hit and yell at the kids.
Yet the biggest problem was, was that they weren't around really. And when Mommy was home she would be sick in her room all the time…
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Alastor Moody is sick of sitting in on funerals, memorials or any such things.
He's been to too many during his long life.
But he'll sit there respectfully, his flask bumping on his side as he shifts in his seat. Kingsley sitting right beside him, his hand on Alastor's good knee.
Moody will try to sit still, but lately his hip has started to bother him.
He wants to look around himself to see who really misses the body that they are casting off today. Moody could lie and say that he knew the man intimately, with his short blonde hair.
But from what he can recall he doesn't even know his name.
He's there as a sign of respect. As well as Shacklebolt's constant nagging.
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There's a little boy no older than seven years old playing with his baby brother outside. The girls are inside cooking and cleaning with their father. The house seems cold and forbidding.
The shingles on the roof are falling off and the paint is cracking and pealing. There are broken chips into the window panes and the actual windows seem to be vulnerable to breaking.
But the little boy plays with his baby brother, pulling out flowers or just finding some things to play make- believe with.
He doesn't listen to the silence around him.
After all Mommy went to a better place where she will stop being sick all the time.
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Alastor Moody can see the line of family that is grieving for they're dead son, father, and husband. He can see that it is all they can do not to break down in front of people… either screaming at them for lack of sincerity or crying that this wasn't supposed to happen.
He can see the child who must be very young. 'Round four or five judging by his size.
Moody's never agreed with bringing children to these things. It's something they will remember the rest of their lives, and still won't understand even when they do understand what it was for.
As he and Kingsley move up to the line to shake the hands of the aggrieved he makes sure to keep eye contact. After all he knows that by looking at his battle scars and such this family will see that perhaps their beloved may have gotten off worse after all.
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When they are inside that big church he can't help but stare at the high ceiling and the odd carpeting. Soft like his Mommy's favourite dress.
He clings tightly to his older sister's hand. She moves closer to him as they walk. He's only seven but she's nine, so he feels really safe with her. Cassy, the beautiful scholar of the family… she's going to be going off to Muggle school because she's not going to be a witch like Mommy or their cousins.
His other sister and brother are on the other side of him. Jacob is being held by Morgan, who's already at Hogwarts… she wants to be a Quidditch player.
Jacob is too small to be doing anything, and all the big people around them are walking really fast so he has to be held.
The little boy doesn't like this place. It feels like the woods when he snuck out there without permission, only more worse.
He's reminded of the pressure on his hand and he steps as close as he possibly can to Cassy.
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He hates the part that comes with waiting before they bring the coffin to lower.
The awkward waiting around before the men start to walk down with it on their shoulders. Kingsley is one of the men who's been asked to do it along with other Aurors.
Alastor had a feeling that if he didn't have a wooden leg he would've been asked to do it as well.
Thank God, for small miracles.
Though now that he thinks of God he thinks it odd that they did this in a church. It's odd because most wizards and witches are not at all religious. Even if they are they tend to lean to the pagan side of it.
But it is a wooden house of God with it's standard cross on the top.
Definitely a church.
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When the little boy is about ten and waiting with anticipation for his Hogwarts letter he can see there's something odd about his younger brother.
He knows what Cassy is now. A squib and that she can't do magic and that's why she goes to Muggle school. He feels sad for her but at the same time he's too excited about being wizard to think about it too much.
And he knows that he's going to get it. He's done magic with his sister Morgan to see if he was magic. And he did it!
But it's Jacob that he worries about.
His younger brother spends too much time inside and when he comes out he goes straight to that church down the road. He doesn't think this is healthy, but when he's asked to go to church with his younger brother he goes.
But he wonders why his younger brother only ever asks him and Cassy. Cassy doesn't usually go because she thinks it's oppression to women… the ten-year-old boy doesn't have a clue as to what that means.
However what bothers him most is that box he sits in and tells all the bad things he does to a man with long funny robes. The little boy likes robes but he doesn't like the man's robes.
"Forgive me Father, for I have sinned…" He hates this. But he does it for Jacob who only talks to him and Cassy.
He does it because his little brother won't be going to Hogwarts for a while yet and will only have Dad and Cassy around to play with him.
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Kingsley comes down with the rest of them.
Moody doesn't focus on him. Instead he looks at the polished cedar of that coffin. The rings and the design of the knots…
He personally doesn't see the point of having a coffin like that. Even the cost of it must have been a lot.
He thinks cremation or even just a burial at sea is better than wasting land by putting dead bodies everywhere.
Yet as a sign of respect he won't say anything about it.
Instead he'll walk with the people behind the company of men to the grave pit where they will ceremoniously lower the coffin.
He'll stand here and watch as there are words from a priest and the coffin is lowered with roses falling on it…
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The little boy is now twelve. He's in Hufflepuff and considered one of the best pupils in his year. He's great at all his classes and even Professor Dumbledore, the new Transfigurations teacher thinks he'll go far.
But there's a snag… he's a bit too paranoid about things going wrong that he tends to overdo things. Such as when in DADA if they are doing exercise drills he'll make his hexes a bit too strong for the teacher to anticipate from a Second Year.
It's summer time and in a month or so he's going to be in Third Year. He can't wait. Though Morgan's going to be in Sixth Year and not very willing to help him as much as last year. But that's OK, he's not a nark and he'll fight his own battles.
Besides, maybe Morgan will help him look after Jacob. He'll only be a First Year, and he's not a fighter like everyone else in the family.
So they'll both help him out.
Cassy's worried because Dad hasn't been home for a long while. Morgan said not to worry, and he's caught Jacob praying to that God of his.
Jacob only speaks to Cassy now. He's stopped speaking to anybody but her.
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The old man with his wooden leg and electric blue eye, positively hates it when the company from a parade such as this breaks up to go separate ways. The way that the family stays behind as everyone else shuffles off to do what they had perhaps originally planned.
Most of all he hates the way that Shacklebolt has to stay and give his deep condolences for the thousandth time.
He wants to yank on that starched collar and pull that man away from the people who should be left alone.
Instead he'll stand there. Leaning on a cane and nodding when they look over at him.
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He's seventeen and about to be apprenticed early for the Auror training… he's thrilled because he can't believe that it's taken him so little time, but a hell of an effort to get to this point.
But he got all his NEWTs and did the qualifications for Auror training so he's all set to do it.
When he's seventeen he also finds out what happened to his family.
He gets a letter from Cassy, who moved to North America where she travels around as a nurse to the old and sick. She stays at their house and works primarily with stroke patients on regaining the feeling in their legs and arms.
In the letter he also finds out that the Jacob, after he ran off when he got his letter to Hogwarts, spent time in Catholic school from where he would eventually go into the priesthood. Cassy's been paying for the school for Jacob. He plans on going to Africa doing missionary work.
Morgan he knows went to knows went to China to work in some Potions she had planned to make for an advancement in Healing Potions. However, no one has heard from her for over a year so it's hope that she's still around.
In the letter Cassy asks for a reply, asking him whether or not she should declare their father dead and give him a proper burial.
He replies, no.
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His hip has started to really hurt him. Even when they finally walk into the door of his little house.
He goes to sit down on his chair.
"Get me some rum, will you?" He brings up his hand and runs it over his face. He's gotten a stinging headache and a back that feels like iron weights have been smashed on it.
Kingsley brings it to him. Setting it beside him as he starts to run his big dark hands through Alastor's whitening hair. The dark fingers travel down to the scars on the face…
"Don't overdo it Alastor." His deep barrelling voice grates on Moody's nerves sometimes.
"Don't like it? Get the hell out of my house." He growls this out.
They both know he doesn't mean it.
Sometimes.
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