Author's note: Hey everyone, I hope life is treating you well! I am currently trying to post this chapter while my cat is having the zoomies and she's going wiiild. So now that I prevented her from walking over the keyboard and deleting this chapter, here we go! Thank you so much to those of you who take the time to show some appreciation of this story! Wish you all a lovely start of the week!
"Take this pink ribbon off my eyes
I'm exposed and it's no big surprise
Don't you think I know exactly where I stand?
This world is forcing me to hold your hand"
- No Doubt
August 1997 - The (Un)Privileged Girl (1947)
"A few years after our marriage, he got involved in politics…"
A scribbling noise rose in the air, and Annabel peeked at the notes the young witch was taking.
"Voldemort entered the Wizengamot in 1945, to work as my father's personal assistant… As you can imagine, he despised that job. Not only because of his position - even though he never liked being told what to do, Voldemort had always been able to put up with authority whenever he deemed it worth it - but also, and mainly, because of his abhorrence for the Ministry…"
She let out a sigh.
"'Magic-endowed worms' was how he used to refer to his colleagues, whom he believed were blindly following the Minister's every order, while he was a free-spirit, someone who did not fear to challenge the status quo… He always had a strong dislike for institutions, which still shows in the all the things he stands for: disorder, rebellion, partisanship. So many things that still appeal to a certain category of people... And soon enough, he was able to create his own"
"His own what?" frowned the Weasley boy.
In the corridor, the clock struck six and the group of kids jumped at the melody. Annabel took a sip of her wine, waiting for the chimes to end.
"His own community"
— — August 1947—
When she entered the operating theatre, the room smelled of sweat and faeces, and Annabel had to hold her breath in order not to throw up in the nearest container.
"Diarrhoea and hypersalivation, slurred speech" listed the mediwizard who was walking next to her.
"Patient was found swimming in Hodge Close Quarry"
Annabel swiftly nodded and she rushed towards the man who was lying on his back on the operating table. Residues of seaweed were stuck to his bare chest and she issued the staff to clean him. She placed her left hand on the man's forehead, and his skin was warm and wet. She closed her eyes, to cast a spell to scan the patient's primary functions.
"Respiratory failure" she yelled before she created a magical oxygen bubble that she placed all around the man's head and asked the mediwizard to second her and to keep the airflow steady.
"He's stable" she declared when the patient's breathing returned to normal, and she moved to the side, now investigating for the reason behind the man's disease. If her assumption was correct, she ought to be quick.
She ran her hands on the man's skin, eyes shut once more, and she grazed his throat with the tip of her fingers as she focused on his trachea. She lowered her hands on his body, across his thorax, all the way to his abdomen, and there, she found a pulse, something that did not belong there.
Swiftly, she asked for a surgical knife, and with a confident gesture, she sunk the knife's tip into the flesh. The man twitched and she ordered for the staff to hold him down before her hand hovered over the wound. A tentacle showed first, then a second and a third, glistening appendages that menacingly rose in the air and tried to fight back the spell she was casting to extract the creature out of the man's body. After one finally effort, the entire squid was finally removed and placed in a container for further observation.
"Tetrodoxin poisoning" she concluded before she wiped her forehead with the inside of her elbow and watched the furious creature knock against the container's glass walls.
"Three pods of okra, to induce regurgitation. Keep him under observation for the next twenty-four hours" she issued regarding the patient who was being levitated out of the room and she exited the operating theatre herself, for the room was being sanitised by the staff, making great use of countless charms and incantations.
She headed towards the healers' lounge, a sunlit room where she washed her hands in the sink, before she finally let herself fall on the closest chair.
"Good job today" greeted one colleague who was standing near the stove. He offered her a cup of coffee which she declined, and he folded that day's edition of the Daily Prophet and placed it on the nearest table.
"I really have to cut back on caffeine" she confessed before she stretched her arms above her head with a yawn.
"It's better at this time of the day anyway" he admitted, and yet, he slurped his coffee and the sound made her laugh.
They began to chat, about anything and everything, their jobs and the backbreaking rhythm at St Mungo's, but also more personal things, the man's difficult relationship with his youngest son, his approaching wedding anniversary.
"By the way" he exclaimed. "I ran into your husband earlier"
"My husband?"
Annabel glanced at the man who sipped some of his drink some more while nodding.
"I was urgently sent to the apothecary because we ran out of bezoars. They're out of stock everywhere…" he grumbled. "Had to go all the way to Mr Mulpepper's in Knockturn Alley…"
"That is odd" she frowned, yet not so much because of the mention of that disreputable place…
"He's supposed to be working late today. Are you sure you did not mistake him with somebody else?"
The man scratched his head with a confused air.
"Well I didn't stop to say hi but it sure looked like him. He was walking down the street in the company of that blond fella… You know, that Quidditch player from the National Team who got sent here right away after a he crashed into another player last month?"
Alastair she thought as she remembered how she had found him in the emergency room with a tumid face a few weeks back.
Annabel pulled on her earlobe as she got absorbed in thoughts.
Tom had left the house that morning asking her not to wait for him for dinner. He was working on a case, something he had been toiling away for weeks and for which he was finally seeing daylight. "I want to be done. I cannot stand the thought of having it stand on my to-do list for another day" he had said before he had kissed her cheek and rushed out of the door shortly after dawn.
It was the first time he left her alone at night in weeks, not ever since he had learned about the big news…
"Well, anyway, if you wanna head off now you should" indicated her colleague before he placed his cup in the sink and shot her one last glance. "I'll take your last shift. I have to stay late anyway since one patient postponed our follow-up appointment… It's my way to repay you for when you replaced me last week"
Annabel nodded, and thanked him before she watched the man leave the room while she herself headed to the dressing room. She slipped out of her healer's robe and into her own clothes, her thoughts racing.
"What could Tom be possibly doing in Diagon Alley when he has to work late?" she wondered as she pulled in her nylons and fixed her hair. She glanced at herself in the mirror, touched-up her lipstick before she peeked through the window, and grabbed her cloak at the sight of the grey clouds that darkened the sky.
Of course, he might have simply been there shortly, to run some errands like her colleague had, sent by her father to the post office or to the bank, to go pick up something in the family vault.
Tom might have simply run into his friend - wasn't Alastair sponsored by Broomstix, that shop in Diagon Alley? - and the two of them might have exchanged a few words, a brief hello and what'sup before Tom would have told Alastair what he had told her that morning and rushed back to the Ministry, right?
Right.
This was a plausible scenario, Annabel told herself as she headed towards the nearest chimney, well-decided to forget all of that nonsense.
Tom would never lie to her.
Why would he?
And yet, once she stood in front of the chimney with her palm full of the powder that was meant to bring her home, Annabel paused and it was with a strange foreboding that she changed her mind and stepped into the hearth.
"Knockturn Alley"
—
The road was surprisingly packed when she arrived, untold wizards who were hanging about in the murky street. Annabel observed the passersby with a puzzling air, for most of them were dressed in the darkest tones, the hoods of their cloaks pulled up, and she noticed how they were all heading in the same direction.
She followed them down the street, past the apothecary and the barber shop, all the way to a staircase at the bottom of which they stopped.
She knew that place, she thought as she glanced at the pub sign - a white dragon that breathed fire - and she looked up to find more people agglutinated up the stairs, crammed in like sardines on the front steps of the White Wyvern. Some were standing on the tip of their toes while others were tilting their head as if to peek into the pub, which seemed just as congested as its threshold.
What could possibly explain such a bustle, she asked herself before she began to thread her way through the crowd, apologising occasionally whenever she stamped on a random foot. The Quidditch season was over, and no game was planned for tonight, she thought as she finally reached the entrance. What if she was crashing some kind of private party?
Yet, once she stood on the doorstep and managed to sidle through the doorway, she froze.
A voice was echoing inside the room, a magnetic voice that she recognised instantly.
She craned her neck to find Tom stand on a makeshift stage - stacked pallets in the back of the room - looking frigthfully gorgeous. He was overlooking the crowd, cladded in jet black clothes, his back straight, and his voice calm, controlled.
He engaged in a diatribe against the Ministry, going over the recent turmoils that had shaken the wizarding world: Gringott's head goblin prosecuted for embezzlement, the scandal of the Minister's nepotistic recruitments.
Her brain picked up on a few words that made her feel uneasy: true wizards, muggle-born, culprits, and she glanced around her to see the people nodding, hung up on her husband's every words.
What the heck was going on? she wondered while she searched for familiar faces, and near the stage, she spotted Nott, and Lestrange, and the oldest son of Burke, with whom she used to go to school with, before the boy was sent to Durmstrang after his parents judged Hogwarts unworthy of their great lineage...
Soon enough she was snapped out of her reverie by the booming sound of cheers, and she watched Tom repress a smug smile, and bow in feigned humility. Yet, she knew how exhilarated he felt, how fast his heart was pounding, she could feel it, like if the two of them were linked by an invisible thread, fruit of that ability of hers to feel what he felt, of that bond that linked her to him.
That damn bond, she thought as a lump grew in her throat, for she now fully understood the implication of her having found him here: he had lied to her.
This morning, when his lips had brushed her cheek, when he had looked her in the eyes and said she should not wait for him for dinner, he had known, all along, that he would be standing here tonight.
She felt her eyes prickle, and a tear ran down her cheek when she heard the people call that name, his name.
Voldemort
A name she thought was only meant for her, that she uttered in the secret moments only they shared, when his taste would linger on her lips, when she would let him torment her, a name he had shared with her in the privacy of his bedroom, a while back, after he had called her his.
—
"Naively enough, I thought I was the only one to know that name" she added with a small ironic laugh.
"Voldemort" she repeated with a sad smile, ignoring how the red-haired boy squeaked before she emptied her glass and poured herself another one directly.
"And after that? What happened?" asked the young witch who had paused with her note-taking and was looking at her quizzically.
"After that, I went home"
— — August 1947—
"Anything else Miss?"
Annabel was lost in her thoughts, her eyes fixated on the window. It had begun to pour a few hours ago, and since then, she had been sitting on the floor, playing absentmindedly with the fringes of the carpet while she stared into space and listened to the pattering rain.
She heard the house elf place a cup of tea on the coffee table, and she dismissed the creature.
"It's late Maeve. You may go"
The sweet perfume of lemon verbena tea filled the air, and she casted a spell to levitate the cup all the way to where she sat before she took a sip of the warm liquid.
Thankfully, the nausea that had plagued her the past few weeks had stopped, and she could finally drink something else than peppermint tea. Yet, she dreamt of something stronger, something to calm her nerves.
She let out a deep sigh, seeking for content in that beverage she now held while she stared at the moon. The living room was plunged in the darkness, but she found the shadow comforting. With the back of her hand, she wiped her cheek, found it a bit humid. By Merlin, how many ounces of tears had she shed, she wondered before she heard the front door unlocking.
The lights of the candelabra switched on all at once, and for a second she was blinded by the sudden light.
"Why are you sitting in the dark?"
Tom's voice rose in the air and she heard his rushed footsteps on the wooden floor. He threw his coat on the couch and crouched down in front of her, anguish disfiguring his handsome features.
"Did you cry?" he frowned, before he gently seized her chin, turned her face towards him.
She recalled how he had found her in the exact same spot a few weeks back, her legs folded against her chest, an untouched glass of wine in hand. That day, Tom had opened the door to find Annabel on the floor, in the obscurity of their apartment, doing nothing but stare into nothingness, and he had asked, in a voice tinged with worry, why her mascara had smeared her cheeks. Except that, back then, relief had washed all over her when she had heard his key slide into the lock, when his footsteps had disturbed the quietude of their place, and she recalled how she had buried her face in his chest when he had crouched down in front of her like now, to share, between two hiccups, the news that still terrified her.
She was with child.
A stupid mistake, a one time thing.
"Did something happened with the baby?" Tom inquired as he searched for her eyes but she pulled away.
"Is that the only thing that matters to you now?" she croaked, and she stood up, to put some distance between her and him.
Oh, the quick change on his face, the cautious look he gave her.
"Where were you tonight?" she asked, her hand turning into a fist.
"Do not lie to me" she threatened him menacingly, like a cat would yowl.
He straightened his back, held her gaze while he parted his lips.
"I was in Knockturn Alley"
He took a breath, watched her carefully. His voice was soft, slightly grieved, and opened and closed her mouth, disconcerted by his unforeseen honesty. Sadness gripped her, heartache that took over her anger, and she felt her lip begin to tremble. She wanted to ask why he lied to her, but she found herself searching for her words, so she simply listened to him pursuing.
"I was asked to give a speech as part of a rally that was taking place at the White Wyvern. I went there to share my thoughts about the current Minister, and the recent events that disturbed the wizarding world"
"Why?" she finally forced out, and she took a step back when he walked towards her.
"Unrest is arising all over the country. People are angry. They're upset. They want change and they need someone to guide them, to be the voice for all of those who cannot speak..."
"Those who got wronged by the Ministry, who became deprived of the right to speak. Those whose lands got stolen, who experience censorship" he added.
"What does this have to do with you?" she whispered, and soon, her back was pressed agains the wall and Tom was towering over her.
He frowned, and gently stroked her cheek with the tip of his fingers.
"Anna, darling... Those people, it's us"
She shook her head, incapable to make sense of his words.
"What?" she asked with wide eyes, bewildered by his blathering, and by the crazed look on his face before he linked her fingers to his and pulled her towards him, led her towards the nearest sideboard.
"You, me" he smiled as he slowly made her spin so she would face the mirror, and he placed two possessive hands on her belly.
"Us"
—
"But you… didn't agree with what he said, did you?"
Annabel noticed the tension in the young witch's voice, and she gave her a reassuring smile.
"No. I didn't"
"But you didn't oppose him"
"I didn't either"
"Why not?" humphed the red-haired boy and she looked at him.
"I cared about very simple things at the time, and my considerations lay far away from politics or dark magic..."
"Besides" she added softly.
"I was a child... I was a twenty-year-old child blessed with a pregnancy I had never planned. I was terrified, and he was all I had"