"This is Tony, uh? The friend?"
"Yup."
"He looks normal. Maybe a bit thin and greasy...but bacon is thin and greasy, too, isn't it..."
Ms. Grymmion held out a chunk of cabbage to Tony, which he realized was her hand, so he shook it.
"It's nice to meet you, Ms. Grymmion."
"Nice. Nice. Let's go home then." She said.
"See you next year, Umar." Said Tony, and with a nod Umar walked away after his mother.
Tony hefted his trunk. Around him students were saying their have-a-good-summers to each other and rushing to their families. He spotted Lily and her brothers jumping off the train with a bunch of Weasleys.
"There they are!" shouted James, the fifth year, pointing to a group of grown-ups further down on the platform. Among mostly red-heads a man with dark hair and glasses stood out. Lily's Father. Harry Potter.
Tony began to hurry toward the portal wall. Then he heard Lily's voice.
"Just a minute, I want to say goodbye to someone!"
Tony walked faster, but she was not carrying her trunk and caught up to him.
"Tony! Is your mother here?"
"She's waiting outside. I hope you have a really great summer, Lily."
Tony was carefully avoiding looking in the direction of her family. He was sure they wouldn't be happy about Lily's choice of aquaintance and he didn't want to see their looks of disgust.
"We will! We are going to Japan; Al has been studying Japanese."
"I thought you said he was studying Sanskrit."
"All of the above." She laughed. "He's kind of crazy. Come, you should meet my parents!"
Tony shook his head quickly. "I need to go. Bye!" He picked up his trunk again and turned away.
"Tony," she sounded hurt, "you don't have to be afraid of them. I promise they won't..."
Tony didn't look back.
oOo
The next year Herbology was with Ravenclaw, so Tony's abilities seemed about average, but he still enjoyed the plants. Potions and Care of Magical Creatures were his next best subjects. He found that with the wand-work in Charms and Transfiguration he needed a lot of practice. That must have come from his mother, who could brew a potion but whose old cherry wand had sat unused on her dresser until she finally sold it to pay for Tony's school things.
Defense Against the Dark Arts was also difficult, perhaps because when Professor Fenwick made her rounds helping students practice, she skipped over Tony. Unfortunately, this was the class Hufflepuff shared with Gryffindor in their third year. Lily Potter was the star. The day that Fenwick had brought in a feisty little Pogrebin for them to practice blocking with the Protego spell, Lily had instead driven it out of the classroom with a beautiful reindeer patronus.
Whether it was because he rejected meeting her family at the station, because he was an embarrassment in her favorite class, or because he still wouldn't presume to talk to her unless she talked to him first, the friendship they had in Herbology last year was lost. It seemed that everyone in their year competed for Lily's attention, and she gave more than a fair bit of it to Liam Finnigan.
oOo
No longer one of the youngest students at Hogwarts, Tony found himself the object of not only disgust and suspicion from older students, but also abject terror from the younger ones. A trio of first years in his own house had a habit of squeaking and running whenever he came in sight. Unexplained and annoying things had been happening: itch powder in his bed sheets, his ink bottle dumped out on his homework, a frowny face cut into all his socks.
He was sitting writing a letter to his mother in one of his favorite rarely-used corridors, when a small form jumped around the corner and shouted, "colloshoo!"
Tony looked up. It took him a moment to realize that his shoes were now stuck to the floor. Two more students emerged behind the first with their wands out and trembling.
"Um...hi?" Tony said.
"hymenopt!" Said the boy in front. Tony felt a prick on his arm. "hymenopt!" The boy repeated louder and this time it was like a wasp had stung Tony's collarbone.
"Whoa whoa! What is going on?"
"We've been practicing hexes, and-and we can fight you now!"
"I don't want to fight you."
"hymenopt!" The kid shot in reply, stinging Tony's shoulder, and one of his friends added, "locomotor wibbly!" making Tony's legs shake. He was glad he was sitting down, but it was still extremely uncomfortable, and if that little bugger did one more...
"Hymenopt!"
As the sting hit his cheek Tony imagined the boy's ribs pushing inward, squeezing and twisting...but no sooner had the thought crossed his mind than Tony felt sick. He threw his wand down and shook his head.
"I don't know who you are but I am not going to hurt you. Leave me alone."
"You d-don't know who I am?
"No."
"Wilhelm. Will Wilhelm... Wilhelm!" He emphasized. "Don't you recognize it?"
"No."
The boy was shaking almost as much as Tony. Then he turned and ran off, followed by his friends.
Tony had to take his feet out of his shoes, then wobble on hands and knees over to pick up his wand and perform finite incantatem.
oOo
At dinner during the last week before the Christmas break a paper airplane landed on Umar's salad. Umar picked it up and unfolded it.
"Oh...this is prob'ly for you." He said. "Sorry."
It was a page torn from a book. The superscript identified the book as Wildest and Worst Wizards of the 20th Century.
The text continued from the previous page,
...stunned by Filius Flitwick and taken directly to Azkaban. During the early period of ministry reform when Dementors were removed and the new system was in development, he escaped twice: first in 2007, caught in South London by Harry Potter and Hawkes Hawlish; and again in 2013, caught in Siberia by Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley and Nina Calhoun.
Known Victims (including muggles):
Tony's head reeled. There were more than a hundred names here, that magically scrolled slowly along the page, categorized into Murdered, Tortured, Captured, Injured, Imperiused.
...Gideon Prewett, Fabian Prewett, Benjy Fenwick...
Tony understood why Professor Fenwick kept her distance.
...Remus Lupin, Alice Longbottom, Frank Longbottom...
Tony looked up at Professor Longbottom to see the professor drop a forkful of potatoes on his robes. He smiled good-humoredly and wiped it off. Tony almost burst with admiration for a man with simple under-spoken courage and goodness.
A name under 'Captured' had been circled. Ernest Wilhelm.
Guilt stung Tony like dozens of hymenopt curses. How many people here were related to someone on this list of victims? What was he doing in this hall full of innocent people? Antonin Antonovich Dolohov, son of Antonin Dolohov. He folded the page, tucked it in the pocket of his robes, stood and walked out into the snow.
He started towards the gates, but remembered that they wouldn't let him out. He wandered toward the forest. Then Umar was walking beside him.
"Cold."
"Yeah, I guess it is. We could go inside."
Umar nodded.
"Tony, you're not him."
Snow continued to fall around them, slowly covering everything beneath it.
"Thanks."
oOo
One Monday morning Tony and Umar were coming to the doors to the great hall for breakfast, when a commotion broke out inside. Umar took little notice and plodded on in, but Tony was knocked to the floor by James and Albus Potter, sprinting out like they were being pursued by a herd of angry hippogriffs. James was holding something red. They were halfway up the stairs when the red paper burst into flames, James dropped it with an "ow!" and a man's voice filled the hall.
"DAISIES, BOYS? IN FEBRUARY?" The voice boomed, "PROFESSOR HAGRID FOUND YOU A KILOMETER DEEP IN THE FORBIDDEN-THE FORBIDDEN FOREST AND THE BEST ANSWER HE AND YOUR HEAD OF HOUSE COULD GET FROM YOU WAS THAT YOU WERE LOOKING FOR DAISIES?"
A woman's voice, with no less force, added, "I HOPE YOU DON'T THINK ANYONE BELIEVES YOU FOR A SECOND! AFTER FIVE AND A HALF YEARS OF GETTING LETTERS ABOUT YOU, JAMES, WE ARE ABSOLUTELY SICK OF IT!"
The man, who was undoubtedly their father, continued. "AND ALBUS, AT FOURTEEN YOU OUGHT TO HAVE MORE SENSE THAN TO FOLLOW HIM AROUND."
"-NOT TO MENTION TAKING ROSE WITH YOU-"
"-AND SCORPIUS MALFOY? HONESTLY? NOW IF I SEE HIS DAD AT THE MINISTRY I WILL HAVE TO APOLOGIZE FOR YOU LANDING HIM IN THE HOSPITAL WING."
"I AM SURPRISED NO ONE GOT MORE HURT. YOU KNOW IT IS DANGEROUS OUT THERE! WE WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU WERE REALLY UP TO. IF THERE IS SOMETHING SERIOUS GOING ON, YOU NEED TO TELL NEVILLE."
"YOU HAVE TWENTY-FOUR HOURS TO TELL PROFESSOR LONGBOTTOM THE WHOLE STORY OR I WILL COME GET THE TRUTH FROM YOU MYSELF."
With that the howler was reduced to ashes. James glared at Albus. "Lovely! Of course they think it was my idea. Daisies...it sounds so lame!"
"I didn't want to lie."
"But you didn't want to tell everything either. I'm going to tell Longbottom after class, sorry if that ruins your plans."
James headed up the stairs.
"Where are you going?" Asked Albus.
"Where are you going?"
"Breakfast."
"Great. See you in detention."
Albus cleaned the scorch marks on the stairs with a spell and came back down, frowning. "What are you looking at?" He growled at Tony as he went past.
Tony had been intimidated by Lily's family before. Now he was doubly so.
oOo
He tried to stop himself from falling in love with her. But whenever he thought he had conquered his feelings, she would wave to him at dinner, or stop to talk to him in the corridor, and his heart would jump. Once Lily found him in an unused classroom practicing transfiguration, and she practiced with him until the desk was chasing its tail and the poor Great Dane didn't know which direction was up. They scratched the dog's ears and laughed as if there were no differences between them, but later when she walked into Defense Against the Dark Arts with Finnigan, Tony went back to acting like he didn't know her.
"We have an excellent opportunity today!" Professor Fenwick announced. "The house-elves found a boggart in a closet, so you will each take a turn doing the riddikulus spell. It works like so..."
Tony thought. What was he most afraid of? His father escaping Azkaban again? Maybe, but the Death Eater was so old now Tony doubted that would happen. Losing his mother? That would be terrible, but there was another fear that confronted him every day: the fear of being unworthy of the friends he desparately wanted. He was afraid of being unworthy of Lily. What form would a boggart take to illustrate that? A reflection of himself immersed in dark magic? How on earth could he make that funny?
Finnigan offered to try the boggart first. It turned into a bludger that whirled around his head so fast it was hardly visible, making the sound of a booing crowd. Finnigan shouted, "riddikulus!" and it turned into a watermelon that fell to the floor in two halves.
Lily stepped forward and the boggart turned into an old wizard Tony had seen pictures of—Dumbledore—with a strange white glow. He shook his head sadly. "The train will come, Lily, but you will have to stay here. The time for choice is past. You took the easy life that was handed to you and never had the courage to stand up for what you knew in your heart."
Lily took a deep breath, "riddikulus!" The figure of Dumbledore became more warm and solid, and said, "nitwit, blubber, oddments, squeak!" The class looked confused, but they laughed and the boggart moved on to another target.
Finally Tony had to step forward. He had no ideas other than to give the boggart a bowtie and make it tap dance; he would just have to see what happened. A lethifold that had become a frilly apron popped, and transformed into a towering man with a sharp lightning scar. It yelled in the booming voice Tony had heard from the howler in the front hall.
"HOW DARE YOU SPEAK TO MY DAUGHTER, ANTONIN DOLOHOV? HOW DARE YOU EVEN LOOK AT HER? YOU CARRY THE NAME OF A FILTHY, EVIL-"
Tony cringed and closed his eyes. This was the most respected wizard in the world; a bowtie and tap dancing was not going to happen. Furthermore, what he said was true and there was nothing funny about it.
Lily was at Tony's side. She shouted "riddikulus!" and the man changed into a truer likeness of Harry Potter: shorter, with softer lines on his face and his scar less noticeable. He grinned as if he was in the middle of telling a story.
"...but the Minister kept droning on and on. It was high time for the meeting to be over, so I snuck a puking pastille." He chuckled. "I got it all over his desk."
The class gasped with laughter. Even Tony had to smile at the idea. The boggart popped one last time and vanished.
Lily said, "The best part was that to make it convincing he stayed home in his pajamas for two days. We had a lovely time."
"You mean that actually happened?" Tony asked.
"Yeah." She smiled.
Professor Fenwick assigned them reading and dismissed the class. On Tony's way out she put a hand on his shoulder. "If you need help with anything, Mr. Dolohov, don't hesitate to ask me."
"Okay, thanks, Professor."
Hey Reviewers! What do you think of Umar as a character? How about Tony-too pathetic, or is he ok? Is my comic relief effective?
One or two more chapters are in the works, and should be more up-beat.
