It had been Easter break of Seventh year.

The year had been terrible, everyone was miserable. When the school year started there had been celebrations on the train from Purebloods and Slytherins thinking that this was going to be our year. That everything was going to be amazing. No more Harry Potter, no more Dumbledore, and no more Gryffindor favoritism.

By the time the Welcome Feast was over we had already seen it was not going to be like that.

The Carrows were there to make everyone miserable. Snape was the new headmaster and he had all the charisma and patience of a wound-up rattlesnake. The vibe around the school was dark and tense and it seemed like all the cheer had been left behind on the train.

We all dragged to our dorms defeated before anything started.

I spent the entire year being harassed by the Carrows, especially Amycus. And by Bellatrix whenever her crazy ass decided to show up to the school. It was basically open season for the Deatheaters to show up whenever they felt like fucking with some kids.

When I went home for Easter break, it was with the determination that I would talk to my mother about not going back. I wasn't going to be going back to the school, not while Snape was in charge.

On the first day home, my mother didn't come to pick us up from the train. Baz and I made our way home- we had already been given our Apparating certifications so that wasn't a big deal but it was mildly annoying. When we got home we found out why she hadn't made it- she was laid out on the couch, already having taken her sleeping potion, it was noon.

I didn't get to talk to her that day. Baz went up to his room- he was battling his own demons at the time. Something he still won't talk to me about. He went up to his room and by the time evening hit, I was tired of sitting in my room by myself.

I decided I would go out. I got changed, Bastian and I had just had our birthday, so I was officially seventeen, so as long as I went to a wizarding club, I didn't even have to figure out how to sneak into the club.

I stood at the bar, waiting for the bartender's attention when a man sidled up to me.

"What are you drinking?" He asked. I indicated the empty bar in front of me.

"The sights," I answered. He laughed, it made me feel good, made me feel clever, something I hadn't felt in far too long.

"Let me buy you a drink."

The two of us spent the entire evening together. We drank, we danced, we talked. At the end of the night, he asked me my name.

"Maybe I'll tell you tomorrow." Was my answer.

I came back the next night and he was there. It was the same thing all over again, dancing, drinking, talking.

"What's your name?" He asked. I told him that maybe I'd tell him tomorrow.

It went on like that for a week. Suddenly my Easter break was saved. I had something to look forward to every night. I would get dressed up and go out and feel like I was special and brilliant and gorgeous. I was so excited I completely forgot to ask my mother about not going back to school. What did I care about silly school problems? I was in love with a man who didn't know my name.

I knew his, of course, he'd introduced himself on that first night.

Calvin Danworth.

We were going to get on the train Sunday to go back to school. I was devastated. Friday night, before we parted ways, he asked me my name. I told him that if he got us a hotel room for the next night, I would tell him my name.

Saturday night I met him at the club, we had a drink and he took me to the hotel room that he had rented for us.

"My name is Coco," I told him.

"Coco, a beautiful name." He kissed me. We had kissed a few times over the past week. That was it, just kissing. His lips were soft, his stubble just a little bit scratchy. It had never gone beyond kissing but we both wanted it to. And that night it did, that night in the hotel room he gave me my first real orgasm, We were up all night touching and kissing and moaning.

I didn't tell him the truth until the morning. That I had to leave, I was going back to school. I expected him to freak out. I expected him to hate me. But he didn't. If anything he seemed more excited. He promised to write to me while I was at school.

And he did. I received letter after letter from him. He would promise me that when I came home after school was over he would take me on a date. We were going to be a real couple. He told me everything I needed desperately to hear because as the school year went on everything got so much worse.

I don't know that any of us were aware of it at the time, but since Voldemort's desperation to find Harry Potter had been ramping up, all the Deatheaters were extra stressed, and of course who better to take it out on than helpless students.

I don't need to go over the Battle of Hogwarts. You were there. I'm sure you remember it, being forced down to the dungeons, nearly losing our lives to the Troll. I've been told since then that it was done to try and save Slytherin students from having to fight their parents but I don't know if I believe that. My parents weren't there and yet, Baz and I were locked down there too.

We survived. That was what mattered. We survived and we went home and I was ready to have my time with Calvin outside of the nightclubs. We could be a proper couple. He met me in the daylight for the first time the day after I came home from school. He took me to lunch. It was magical.

I was head over heels in love.

The first couple of weeks had been magical. We would go out on dates, He always took me to new and interesting places. He told me going to dinner on Diagon wasn't special enough.

And I was a big enough idiot to believe him.

We always would go to hotels after. I asked him about going back to his place- That he didn't need to spoil me with hotel rooms, I'd be more than happy do to dinner at his place and just chill. He insisted that I deserved the best, and the best meant going out and luxury hotel rooms with silky soft sheets.

I told him again that it wasn't necessary. I wanted to see his home, where he lived. The next time we went out he surprised me with a cottage. A whole cottage. He said that it was our haven, and that he wanted to have a fresh new space for him and me to make our own.

Then, it happened. After all the hassle of getting the NEWTs done, I had been at the Ministry, I was trying to get my job at The Prophet and I was talking to Helene.

That was when I saw him, he was in the cafeteria with a gorgeous woman. At first, I thought maybe she worked for the ministry too, so I casually asked Helene about her.

"Oh, is that Calvin Danworth?"

"Hmm? Oh, yes, you know him?"

"Yeah- Yes. He's a friend of my mother's… who is that with him?" The look she gave me was like I was an actual moron. It was the first time all day that I had felt any kind of nervous even though I was trying to get a job.

"That's his wife."

Something that a family friend would know about. Something that I didn't know about. A wife- he had a wife. He wasn't taking me out because I was special. Because I deserved the best and he wanted to give me all kinds of new and amazing opportunities. He couldn't take me to his home because his wife was there, probably asleep with no idea that her husband was out with another woman.

It was a punch to the gut. I could feel my heart ripping in two.

'Genevieve Selwyn?'

'Yes?'

'My name is Sampson Dorit. I have some unfortunate news'

I was the other woman. I was a cheater. I was as bad as my father.

I managed to get through the rest of my interview and I had to go. I hurried out of there, vowing that I would never see that man again.

We'd made plans to meet up for a date the very next night, I stood him up. The next day I got a letter at home from him, asking what had happened. I burned the letter, I knew I should have burned all the letters, everything he had sent me over the years. But I couldn't make myself do it. I stood in front of the fire with the box of letters in my hand, and the idea of throwing them out hurt more than anything I could imagine.

I tried to go back to life as usual, but every day I knew in my heart that I was my father's daughter and that I could have ruined their family. I didn't know if they had kids or if she knew that he was a cheater. I hated myself for what he turned me into.

I've never really felt self-loathing before, but knowing what I had done- I couldn't handle it.

Then on my first day of work, he saw me in the cafeteria. I'd never seen someone go so pale so quickly in my life.

"Coco- what are you doing here?" he asked.

"I work for The Prophet now." Baz was walking up and I just needed this man to go away before Baz found out what I had done and hated me too.

"You- Oh you do."

"Sure do. Tell your wife I said hi." I have no idea how he reacted to that, I didn't give him a chance to say anything else. I simply walked away, meeting with my brother and the food that he was holding.

"That was the last time I talked to him- before going down to your office- when you gave me the ring." I finished the story, wiping my eyes, tears had been steadily streaming down them since I started talking. "What's really ironic is that Helene sent me to get the statement from him that day because I had told her that he was friends with my mother. She figured he would move a little faster for me since I knew him."

Silence.

I looked up at Theodore's face. I had never seen such rage before in my life.

"Theodore." My voice was soft. I hated how shaky it was. Telling the story left me feeling raw.

I hadn't told anyone, not even Baz about what had happened. I couldn't handle the judgment. I got judged for a lot of things in my life, the way I spoke, my attitude, and the way I dressed. It was all stuff I could control. Even being judged for what my father did, didn't really bother me because I'd built up a thick skin over the years. But this- this was something fresh and painful and I wasn't prepared to deal with judgment over that.

Theodore reached over and pressed the button to make the elevator move again. He didn't speak, the rage on his face had dropped away, covered by a blank mask.

"Theodore," I repeated, a little stronger this time, reaching out to touch him

"Don't." He snapped. I reared back as if I had been slapped. Oh. The elevator stopped and the doors opened. I quickly picked up the folder from the floor, watching as Theodore stormed off. I didn't move, completely frozen as the elevator filled with people again.

"What floor are you on, sweetheart?" A kind older woman asked.

"This one." My voice cracked. She looked at me confused.

"Do you need off the elevator?" I shook my head. I wasn't sure I could move. She watched me a moment then shrugged and hit the button she needed.

I did eventually make my way off the elevator. I gave the statement to Helene and quickly excused myself for the rest of the day. I hurried home, hoping that I would find Theodore there, but he wasn't in our bedroom. He wasn't in the kitchen- I searched all over, in every room but his father's. Theodore wasn't there.

By this point my brain had kicked back into gear and was doing what it did best, turning pain into anger.

"Fuck you." I snapped at no one, storming back up to the bedroom. I snatched the bottle of whiskey, the one from our wedding night from the bar cart in the sitting room.

I popped the top off and I took a drink directly from the bottle. My chest felt tight, like I couldn't take a full breath.

Tears picked at my eyes but I didn't let them free. I took another drink of the whiskey and headed for my closet.

One of the first things I had done after being moved into the Nott house was figure out where in the hell the magic that moved all my stuff had put the box, the golden lock box where I had kept all those letters I couldn't bring myself to burn a few months ago.

I had found it under the bed of all places, but I had moved it to my closet and that was where I went now, climbing up the shelves of my shoe rack to get the box from the top. I unlocked it with the key in my vanity and I took it to the sitting room.

I placed both the box and the bottle of whiskey on the floor carefully before going back to the closet. I changed out of my nice work outfit and into a pair of sleep shorts. I grabbed a shirt and pulled it on but it wasn't enough. I needed something- else. After trying on and rejecting six of my own shirts, I gave up and wandered over to Theodore's closet.

I found what I wanted almost immediately. I snatched a sweater from one of his hangers and pulled it over my head. It was large, covering the hem of the shorts I wore, and it was the right amount of heavy. The tightness in my chest loosened the tiniest bit.

I turned my head and buried my nose against my shoulder and inhaled. It smelled like Theodore. Like cedar and tobacco, I wrapped my arms around myself for a moment, refusing to think about why I found solace in this man's sweater that smelled like him. I still didn't like my husband.

That done, I went back to the sitting room, opening the box after I sat down, cross-legged in front of the fire between the sweater and the roaring fire I was roasting but I knew I needed to do this. I picked up the bottle of whiskey for another sip before I took the letter on top.

'My dearest Cordelia' It started. I read over every word. His professions of love. Telling me how beautiful I was, how perfect. He had gone on for half a page about how smooth my skin was and how he couldn't wait for me to come home so he could show me how much he appreciated me over and over.

That was when I let the tears flow, drops fell to the parchment as I devoured every word, at the end it was signed 'Love, Cal'

I chucked it into the fire.

It caught right away, it was paper after all. My eyes remained glued to the fire until the last little embers of the note were gone.

Then I picked up the next letter. Reading it over. I remembered what I had written to him in response to the first letter, word for word. I knew exactly what he was answering with each line of text.

He waxed poetically about how badly he wanted to see me on my knees. About how much he loved my lips and how sweet and innocent I would look staring up at him like a good girl.

I laughed at that. I knew at the time I had been so entranced by him that the thought of it had excited me but with a little time and clarity I knew- there was nothing innocent about the way I looked up at a man when I was blowing him. I didn't have the good girl stare.

I tossed it into the fire as well. That one felt better. Tossing it into the fire lifted another weight from my chest. I sipped from the bottle this time watching the fire take his words straight to hell.

I did that for the next couple of hours. I read each letter, eventually, I stood up and read them out loud. Each time I realized just how- ridiculous they were. They weren't romantic, they weren't hot. They were the ramblings of a man cheating on his wife with a woman who was to damn young for him. A man who was under the impression that he was the first man to ever try and turn this young woman on.

It occurred to me during the reading that he might have thought he was my first. The thought made me laugh, he certainly was not. The first man to make me cum- yes, but he hadn't taken my virginity.

With a chuckle, I threw the final letter into the fire and hugged the whiskey to my chest. I was nicely buzzed, and feeling much better. Every last letter was gone, they were no longer a dirty little secret hanging over my head. I would never go back to those notes and mourn the fool who thought she had found true love.

I had been curled up in the chair when the door to the bedroom finally opened and I popped my head up over the back of the chair, watching with wide eyes as my husband stepped through the door.