Chapter 10

Ooft was the sound that accompanied Allegra's slight winding as she landed on the edge of a bed. The sound of rummaging was coming from a nearby wardrobe, occasionally a t-shirt or another garment would fly out.

"It's here somewhere ... one of these shoeboxes ... just a minute, Allegra ... maybe it's this one ..." someone mumbled from within the wardrobe.

Confused, dazed and still crying she looked around her surroundings. It was a small burgundy room, two beds, with quidditch posters covering almost every inch of wall space: it was Ron's room.

A feeling of relief washed over Allegra and she let out a sigh. The safety of Ron's room almost too much. She was now in the room where she had lived for the four months following her mother's death, before they moved to their current house in West Sussex. Nothing bad had ever happened in Ron's room.

"Ah, here it is." A very, very young Ron appeared from the wardrobe in the corner holding a pale yellow shoebox. Ron's pre-adolescent voice almost made Allegra laugh, but he seemed to think that she was going to cry again and quickly rushed to her side.

"What's that?" Allegra asked, eyeing the box in his lap.

"This is my best-friend-box. It's where I've put our favourite photos." Ron took the lid off the box and inside was, as he had said, a messy pile of photographs. "Whenever I'm sad I look at them." He took a few out; there were pictures of Allegra and Ron, Allegra and Charlie, his family, Allegra's family and many others. "There are some of your mum in here, we can put them up in here, if you want. That way you can look at them while you stay in my room."

"Thanks, Ron," Allegra smiled.

"It's okay," he shrugged, because he genuinely believed it was nothing, "hey, we can share my mummy now if you want, it's not like she will mind being shared." Allegra laughed. "Come on," Ron said, "we better get down there."

Ron jumped down off the bed and took Allegra's hand as she followed. Ron was dressed in smart trousers, a pale blue shirt and a green tie, which he would fiddle with every few minutes while making an uncomfortable expression. Allegra immediately noticed that she, too, was dressed in smart attire, hers was a black pinafore dress, white t-shirt, white socks with a silvery frilly trim and black dolly shoes.

Ron lead her down through the levels of The Burrow and she soon found herself outside in the front yard where there was a large gathering of people in dark clothing, wearing a mixture of expressions. Some people she recognised, some she didn't.

"Come on, Allegra, Charlie's over there waiting for you. With all the others." Ron pulled her over to the group of children in the garden, keeping out of the way of the ancient old ladies, all of whom cooed at Allegra and Ron holding hands as they passed.

"Oh, Gladys, look!"

"Isn't that adorable!"

"Oh, young love at its prime!" Ron choked and glared at the old woman who wasn't much taller than the two of them.

"That's a death trap, you two. You were lucky to make it out alive," a fourteen year old Tonks said, her hair turned black with a pink streak for the occasion.

"Yeah well, you're lucky you didn't get the whole 'oh, identical twins, how cute!' stuff that me and George did." Fred said.

"Yeah, nor the cheek pinching," George added solemnly.

"Ginny managed to hide behind me," Bill said, patting tiny Ginny on the head, she was still clinging to one of his legs, "I'm old enough for them to just want to glare at me."

"Come on, Ali, we better get going around the back," Charlie offered Allegra his hand. It was strange to look at everyone as they were seven years ago. Charlie also had different colour hair, he had dyed it brown in his sixth year, much to his mother's despair, and never gone back. Allegra smiled and nodded, she took his hand and walked through the - gnome-free thanks to the boys - back garden to where the service was going to take place. Some seats were already filled. "The front two rows are reserved already; our seats have our names on," Charlie said looking down at her as they walked up the centre aisle, Ron jogging to catch up after being mobbed by granzillas. "Here." Allegra was sitting in the middle of Ron and Charlie. She watched other guests arriving at their seats until Ron squeezed her hand, which he had taken to reassure himself he was doing something to help, and Charlie shook the arm he had around her.

"We are here today to celebrate the life of Samantha Charlotte Boone. She was a woman with many wonderful traits that she shared throughout the magical community and with the people she loved. She had an extremely full life for someone so tragically struck short at the young age of thirty-six. She was Deputy Head Auror for the Ministry of Magic, a caring and devoted mother, a loving wife, admirable friend, and an all-round estimable woman. Now we will have a few words from Head of the Aurors, Kingsley Shacklebolt."

Allegra listened to the kind words the speakers had to say. The occasion was sad, but it was nice to hear about her mother again. Allegra also remembered that, as her mother would have wanted, the after party was a lot of fun.

Allegra's father got up to speak, and she could see the pain and exhaustion all over his face. "Firstly, I'm sorry to all those who are only two days into their summer break from Hogwarts. Right ..." he took a deep breath, "Sam was ... that person who fills in every gap in your life you never knew existed. She put a smile on my face every day, even when she was angry and didn't want me to. I - I don't believe I'll ever meet another person who compares to her. I don't believe in true love, but I do believe that you know when you've met someone so completely compatible with you that you'd have trouble without them. The first time that we spoke to each other was when I was a sixth year and she was a fourth, we were both in Gryffindor. We knew of each other, of course, but we'd never really spoken, not properly. I was up late one night finishing my plans for the quidditch team for the following week - it must have been two or something, because the elves had come in to clean - when suddenly I heard a shriek and she tumbled down the stairs from the girl's dormitories and said, 'stupid bloody stairs'." Michael smiled. "I jumped over the back of the sofa and offered her a hand, which she eventually took, and I went back to my plans and she sat in the armchair nearby. After a long silence, she took the piss out of my handwriting, I commented on the gracefulness of her stair descending and we ended up talking until five when we fell asleep.

"After that we started to spend time together, and became pretty inseparable. Her last two years of Hogwarts was hard for me, and we tried dating other people. It never worked, for either of us. Six months after she finished I asked her to marry me." He looked down and smiled, but as quickly as it had come it had gone. "Now that she's gone ... if I didn't have Allegra I don't know what I would do." He tried to speak more, but he got to a point where he couldn't go on.

By the end of the service Allegra had buried her head into Charlie's arm.

"Allegra, it's over now, you can look."

"Allegra, can you come with me a minute?" Ron had stood up and was now standing in front of her. Allegra nodded and started to follow him. "It will cheer you up, hopefully," Ron mumbled. Eventually they came to the edge of the forest which they then entered.

"Where are we going, Ron?"

"Just through here, wait a minute." After a minute of following a small pathway through the ferns and trees she came to a light clearing with a smooth grass floor and a log.

"It's so pretty," Allegra said.

"Do you like it?"

"Yeah," Allegra nodded.

"Good, because it's our special spot." Ron turned back to see Allegra looking at him. "I thought you might like a quiet place. You could come here to think about your mum." They walked into the clearing and sat down on the log. "D'you promise to keep it a secret? It's just ours. Even when we get older, even when we are really old like those people out there." Allegra giggled.

"Not even Charlie or Ginny, okay?"

Allegra nodded, "I promise."

"Come on then, we better go back. Charlie wants to dance with you and my - our mum will start worrying." He grinned and Allegra laughed softly. Ron stood up on the log and jumped off. Allegra stood on the log and jumped. She fell through the ground, into the silent darkness below.