7th September (continued...)
We had double potions first thing this morning, there was always something about this lesson that made me feel nervous. Professor Snape had re-arranged his seating plan so that Harry was right in his line of view from his desk with Ron and Hermione on either side and Neville opposite. Snape liked to keep an eye on him, too. As usual, I was spilt from them, at a table with Crabbe and Goyle who bothered me by laughing, telling vulgar jokes and teasing me about anything they could think of.
The potion we were brewing today was the shrinking solution that we had written about for homework over the holidays. It was a tricky list of instructions that required fine detail. Having no one to talk to, or no one that I would choose to talk to, I sailed through juicing the shrivelfigs, finely chopping daisy roots, adding the five hairy caterpillars and the well-shaken wormwood. That is until Draco Malfoy swaggered into our classroom, making a fuss as always, sitting down beside me without even consulting our teacher.
"Does it hurt, Draco?" Pansy Parkinson called out, desperate for his attention.
"Yeah, a moment or two later and I think I may have lost my arm…" Draco tried his best grimace and once Pansy turned away he winked at both Crabbe and Goyle.
"Ugh." It came out a little too loud. It was disgusting how people fell at his feet as though he was royalty. Why Professor Snape didn't tell him off for being loud or disruptive, I should have been used to it by now.
Draco looked up at me, noticing the necklace, he was standing centimetres away from me as he whispered, "Where'd you get that?"
I whispered back, "Your mum sent it to me this morning, for saving your life."
"It's just I thought it was- I thought- Hmmm… You couldn't- shouldn't..." He muttered to himself as he one-handedly got out the ingredients.
"Do you need a hand there?" I asked him, "By the sounds of it, you're still drugged up!"
A sly smile appeared on his face as he placed his cauldron down on Harry's desk with a thud, "Sir," Draco called out to Snape, "Sir, I'll need help cutting up these daisy roots because of my arm…"
"Weasley, cut up Malfoy's roots for him."
I could just see Ron's face go brick red. Next thing, Harry was being a servant to Malfoy, too. Snape stood to inspect cauldrons, peering into mine he nodded at the bright acid green potion and waved his wand to complete the process.
Next, he went to Neville's cauldron. "Orange, Longbottom?" his face went red and he was on the verge of tears, which really wasn't helped by his fear of Professor Snape. Hermione offered to help him fix it, but was shunned for 'showing off' which was true, but he didn't have to be so rude about it.
As we were all tidying up, letting the potions simmer, Seamus grabbed my attention as he approached Harry's table, "They reckon Sirius Black has been sighted."
"Where?" Harry and Ron said quickly.
"Duff Town."
"That's not far from here!" Hermione interjected.
"A muggle made the sighting and called the hotline, but by the time the Ministry got there, he was gone…"
"Have you got a problem Malfoy? Anything else need skinning?" Ron noticed that Draco was nosing into our conversation.
Draco smiled a cunning smile, "I'm just surprised you haven't gone after him already, Potter, given that he's close by."
"Why would I go after him?"
"If it was me, I would have done something by now. I wouldn't be staying in school like a good boy. I'd be out looking for him."
"What are you going on about, Malfoy?" Ron said roughly.
"You don't know, do you Potter?"
"KNOW WHAT?" Harry was angry now.
Snape commanded the attention of the class, "Everyone should be tidying up. Quiet in the first table another word and detentions will be given. We shall all gather around Mr Longbottom's potion in two minutes to test it on his toad."
"Draco," I tried to get his attention, "Is there anything I should know?"
He smiled his cunning smile, "What do you want to know?"
I rolled my eyes at him, "About Sirius Black?"
"No, not you, just Harry…" I could see he was thinking, "for now…"
Before I could do or say anything else, Snape was giving off (yet again) about Neville and Hermione. Hermione had whispered to Neville how to correct his potion, so that the potion would not be poison if it were given to Trevor the toad. 5 points were taken from Gryffindor. We all knew it could have been worse.
After class, Hermione disappeared when Harry and Ron were talking away to her, saying that she should have lied about helping Neville. Expecting a response, they turned around to find that she wasn't there and instead she was running down the stairs in front of us carrying her schoolbag with noticeably more books than one minute ago.
"Surely Hermione came out of the classroom after us?" Harry looked between Ron and me.
"She went before you, to get some books for homework, I think she plans on going to-"
"The library." The boys finished my sentence, Hermione was predictable in that way, which made lying (although I don't particularly enjoy doing it), that little bit easier. Though predictable she may be, I don't think she has common sense. She had that much stuff in her schoolbag that the strap broke and all her books came flying out. I'm surprised she didn't see it happening. Slightly embarrassed, she handed out bundles of books to the three of us as she forced them back into her bag and hauled it behind her as we went into the Great Hall for lunch.
I smiled at Oliver as he caught my eye. He signalled for me to sit in the free seat beside him, Harry, Ron and Hermione followed my lead.
"Everything okay with you today, Mrs?" he spoke softly so as only I could hear. He must have noticed that Hermione was sitting at the opposite side of the table beside Harry.
"Yes, thanks." I said whilst ladling vegetable soup into my bowl.
He continued the conversation, "Did she own up?"
"Of course she did." I tried to stop myself from grinning (and almost spitting my soup out, that would have been far too attractive), "I told you I was right, and she took it back, it was just… complicated…"
"How so?" he looked confused, "You do live in a fantasy world, don't you?" he bit his lip, knowing that he was risking it.
I shook my head, "You're a chancer, aren't you?" Taking a bite into the freshly baked roll.
"I like to live my life that way."
We arrived excitedly at out first Defence Against the Dark Arts class, to find that Professor Lupin wasn't there, I did hope that he wasn't sick, he looked peaky on the train. Having a look inside the classroom, we saw a few other Gryffindors sitting down with their books out, ready to go.
A minute or so later, Lupin arrived and told us to pack up as we were going to have a PRACTICAL lesson. We hadn't had one of those for a whole year when Lockhart decided that Cornish Pixies could get the better of him. I hope that Lupin is going to teach us something this year. None of this constant note taking and 'Quizzes About Me' melarky, yes, I enjoyed the sarcasm, but I really wanted to know how to defend myself.
Our class was taken to the Staff Room where we encountered an ever-grumpy Professor Snape who hadn't a single nice word to say to his new colleague and we encountered a shaking wardrobe. As Snape was about to leave the room, he gave Lupin a snide warning "This class contains Neville Longbottom, I would advise you not to entrust him with anything difficult. Not unless Miss Granger is hissing comments into his ear."
Neville went bright red.
Lupin looked at Snape, as though he knew Snape was a horrible man who couldn't keep his comments to himself and replied, "I was hoping that Neville would assist me in the first stage of our operation," Lupin looked to Neville and smiled, if anything, Neville went a little more red, "I'm confident he will perform admirably. Now, shall we get on with our lesson..?"
"Now, don't worry about the wardrobe," Lupin said, walking toward it, "there's a Boggart in there." The wardrobe gave another shake and our class took a cautious step backwards. "Boggarts like dark, enclosed spaces- wardrobes, beneath beds, cupboards under sinks. Now the first question we must ask ourselves is, what is a Boggart?"
Naturally, Hermione's hand shot up in the air, "It's a shape-shifter," she said, "it can take the shape of whatever it thinks will frighten us most."
"I couldn't have put it better myself." Lupin nodded in approval. "So the Boggart within has not yet assumed a form. He does not yet know what will frighten the person on the other side of the door. Nobody knows what a Boggart looks like when he is alone, but when I let him out, he will immediately take form of whatever each of us most fears."
Neville spluttered in terror, knowing that he was about to face his fears.
Choosing to ignore him, Lupin continued, "We do, however have an advantage over this Boggart before we begin. Harry, have you spotted it?"
Ron and I exchanged a look. We felt sorry for Harry who had just been put on the spot, and to make it worse, Hermione was standing with her hand waving in the air, bobbing up and down on the balls of her feet. Talk about off-putting. But he did his best as he answered, "Eh… because there are so many of us, it won't know what shape it should be?"
"Precisely!" Lupin smiled, "The charm is a simple one, if you would repeat after me, without wands, 'Riddikulus'."
"Riddikulus!" our class said together.
"Good!" Lupin exclaimed, "Unfortunately that was the easy bit, as the incantation alone is not enough, this is where you come in Neville. You must use your mind to force the Boggart to assume another form. Neville- what is it that frightens you most in the world?"
After a second attempt to get his words out, Neville whispered, "Professor Snape." Our class couldn't help but giggle at his response. Lupin didn't seem phased by his response, rather, he looked thoughtful. He asked Neville if he lived with his Grandmother, yet everyone knew that. Then he asked Neville to describe her clothes- a green dress, a black hat with a stuffed vulture on top, a fox-fur scarf and a red handbag was his response. What happened next we weren't expecting as Lupin asked Neville to imagine Snape wearing his Grandmother's clothes. That is how we were going to defeat the Boggart, with laughter.
Then Lupin opened the question to the rest of the class- what were we most afraid of and how were we going to make ourselves laugh about it? What scared me the most- that I knew, but how to make my murdering Auntie a laughing stock, that I was struggling with. I had worked so hard for so many years to forget that woman, what she did and how she made me feel. Just thinking about her made shivers roll down my spine.
Professor Lupin asked if we were ready, my insides were shouting 'NOOOOOO!' but I quickly thought of something and readied myself to face that woman again.
Neville stood forward, and the Boggart shaped into Snape.
"Riddikulus!" Neville squeaked and with a whip and a 'crack', Snape stumbled and rose wearing a green dress, a black hat with a stuffed vulture on top, a fox-fur scarf and a red handbag even more hideous than any of us could ever have imagined. Our class let our a roar of laughter.
"Parvati, forward!" Lupin shouted above the sound of his students.
Parvati took a deep breath as she stepped forward and the Boggart changed into a blood-stained, bandaged mummy, it turned to Parvati and moved slowly, dragging its feet and raising it's stiff arms- "Riddikulus!" she cried out. The bandage fell to the mummy's feet and it's head fell onto the floor and rolled away.
Again, the class was consumed with laughter.
"Excellent, Ron you next!" Lupin called.
Ron stood forward 'crack' the Boggart changed into one of the massive spiders that we had encountered the year before. This encouraged a few screams from many of my classmates. The spider clicked its pincers menacingly. I could see Ron's knees shake as though they were about to buckle, before he shouted "Riddikulus!" and the spider lost all eight of its legs and it rolled helplessly on the ground!
"Lavender, you're up!"
She screamed at the sight of the spider and it got louder as 'crack' the Boggart had transformed into a snake which hissed and leaned forward toward us all when 'Riddikulus!' it changed into a Jack-in-the-Box swinging back and forth.
"Kathryn! Off you go!"I looked at our teacher disapprovingly as I took a step forward toward 'crack' the person I had been having nightmares about since I was six years old. The girl's long blonde hair looked like it was dipped in blood: her hands and face were completely covered. She looked enraged in my direction, limping heavily on a damaged leg, carrying a bloody knife shouting, "WHAT DID YOU SEE? WHAT DID YOU DO?" adrenaline pumped through my body as I shook with fear, raising my wand in the air, calling out to anyone who would listen, "Riddikulus!" The demonic woman acquired green skin, a green hat, a pair of dungarees and buckled shoes and started (poorly) performing Irish Dancing like I remember her doing one New Years Eve when she was very drunk.
There was little laughter in our classroom as I stepped back and the Boggart cracked between being a snake, a spider, a severed hand, an eyeball, and a rat.
"It's confused, well done!"
But before Lupin could name the next person, the Boggart approached Harry, and it changed quickly into into a dementor. Lupin quickly interrupted and 'crack' the Boggart changed into a bright orb. Lazily Lupin said, "Riddikulus" and let Neville take the last go at the Boggart before Lupin put it back into the wardrobe.
"Excellent work today! 5 points each to all of you who tackled the Boggart, ten to Neville who did so twice and 5 each to Harry and Hermione for their correct answers. For homework I request that you read the chapter on Boggarts and summarise it to be handed in during our class on Monday. Thank you, that concludes our class for today, you are dismissed."
I went to collect my bag that was stashed at the side of the room and everyone was talking excitedly about our class. Harry seemed a little dejected and I went to talk to him but I was interrupted.
"Miss Pink?"
"Yes?" I answered.
"A word, back in my classroom, if you don't mind?"
I was in trouble. I had to be.
Hermione gave me a worried look and left the room with Ron and Harry, "See you in the Common Room."
Professor Lupin and I walked in silence toward Professor McGonagall's room where she was in deep conversation with Professor Flitwick and a small group of student who must have been prefects, "Excuse me, Professor McGonagall, I do request your presence in my office whenever you have a minute. It's important." I hid my face from Oliver- why did he always have to be there when I was in trouble?
We continued along the corridors and into Lupin's office where he encouraged me to take a seat, "I'm sorry for the language I'm about to use, but… What in Merlin's Beard was that Boggart?"
"Nothing for you to worry about, Professor." I tried my best to smile, but I looked down at my hands to see that I was still shaking from all that had happened.
"I don't imagine that." He sighed, "Look, Kathryn, I'm here to help. Trust me, I know what fear looks like and I also know what reliving your worst nightmare looks like as well…."
He knew me, I didn't know how, but he knew me, "Professor, in all respect, don't ask questions you don't want to know the answer to."
"I want to know, so that I can help you, so that we can help you." He looked up and saw Professor McGonagall who had just entered the room, "please excuse us a second so I can fill in Professor McGonagall with my concerns."
"Here, have a cup of tea my dear." Professor McGonagall waved her wand and a cup of tea and a tin of ginger newts appeared.
My two teachers left the room and talked in whispers in the classroom, the only two words I heard were from a surprised Lupin which were "She's not!" A few minutes later, Lupin looked even more concerned as he took a seat opposite me and McGonagall took a seat beside me.
"May I ask you a few questions?" Lupin was clearly taking the lead in this interrogation, McGonagall has had plenty of experience already.
"Sure."
"Do you trust us enough to tell the truth?" He looked thoughtfully at me.
I looked to McGonagall, "Can I trust him?" She nodded. "Will you please promise not to freak out or tell everyone or do anything… stupid?" I said calmly, "I've been through enough interviews and therapy sessions to know that everything has been done to stop it happening again."
"Yes, dear." McGonagall sat forward in her chair, expectantly, hinting at Lupin to do the same.
"Of course." He said, "May I ask who the woman was?"
"My Auntie, Dad's sister Barbara."
"Would you mind telling us, in your own words what happened in the lead up to that memory that I saw in class today?"
I knew that my two teachers really didn't want to know what I was about to reveal, but I also knew that the two of them wouldn't let me be until I told them, so either way I was going to have to tell them or lie. I had far too much respect for Professor McGonagall and new found respect for Professor Lupin to hide the truth. So I began:
"From a young age when both of my parents were at work, my Auntie used to look after me and then when my brother came along, she looked after him as well. Uncle Gary had a great job, allowing Barbara to stay at home, she always wanted children but for whatever reason never had any… She treated me like I was her own daughter doing normal motherly things. Well, I thought that she was normal, because she was all that I knew. When I was naughty, she hit me, but my parents did that, too. As I got older, about six years old, Barbara claimed that I had an accident when she burnt my hand on the stove and she gave me a black eye. All I remember was opening her drawers in her bedroom when she was at the toilet and I stumbled across a white substance, that's when I got a black eye, so that I wouldn't remember seeing it. She burnt my hand because I touched her depression medication, I thought they were pink sweets, the moral for that one was so I didn't touch them again. Either way, I remember my Aunt and Uncle had been arguing a lot. Barbara was taking a lot of pills and seemed to be taking her anger out on her husband. I remember one afternoon after school, Uncle Gary came home early from work and they put both me and Peter to bed. I couldn't sleep- they were shouting and yelling, so I went downstairs and looked through the ajar door. Gary had pinned Barbara down on the floor and was shouting at her, for taking drugs and hurting me. He knew it was her. He had finally worked out what was happening the night before when she was making dinner and threatened me when I got in her way. I'm not sure how she did it, but she managed to break free from his grip and grab a kitchen knife. She stabbed it into his chest over and over and over and over again. She stood over his dead body and shouted, "Can't say anything to my perfect brother now, can you?" I backed away from the door at this point, she was laughing to herself. I was so frightened. I remember being taught in school that if anyone was in danger that you needed to call the police and that if anyone was hurt you had to call the ambulance and that if there was a fire you had to call for the firemen. So I rang 999 from the phone, saying that my Uncle was dead and that my Auntie had a knife and that I was very scared. The lady at the end of the phone asked me where I was, I told her that I was in the yellow house up the hill from my school, which was Beachgrove Primary School. She told me to stay on the line, but I couldn't, I dropped the phone on the floor as Barbara had heard me and came running toward me, hands, face and hair covered in blood and her leg was bleeding too. "WHAT DID YOU SEE? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?" she shouted at me, I was petrified. She lifted up the phone and said in as calm a voice as possible, "Everything is okay here, false alarm." And slammed the phone down. Then she started pleading with me, saying that it was all a game and asked if I wanted to watch TV because I was such a good girl. She went back into the kitchen to try and clean up the mess when about ten minutes later sirens showed up at her house and she grabbed me as her hostage, and she held me close to her body, with the bloody knife held against my throat. It was cutting into me and I shook with fear. One of the officers took a step forward to try and diffuse the situation. She pierced the knife into the top of left arm and stabbed me just below my collarbone in one swift motion. One of the officers shot her in the shoulder and quickly arrested her and brought her to hospital. They bagged Gary's body and a lady sat with me the whole time whilst the paramedics saw to my injuries as my body bled and bled. I told her about my brother and he was seen to as well, luckily he was peacefully asleep during it all. I couldn't stop crying; I didn't quite understand what had happened. I was taken to the hospital and then the police station with mum to make my statement time and time again.
That was the last I saw of both Gary and Barbara but I will never forget what had taken place before my eyes that day. As a result, I was labelled 'trouble' and had no friends in school because their parents told them to stay away from the girl with the crazy family. What made it worse was when my magic started to show, then people actually became frightened of me. I've been to countless counselling sessions and I've come to terms with what had taken place and I'll be okay, it's just that your lesson brought back that particular memory and I apologise for scaring you, Professor."
My two teachers sat there, completely speechless.
"I told you you didn't want to know."