Abigail Ellery Bones (nee Norton): 22, mediwitch-in-training, neutral (deaf in one ear & hoh in the other, bolded dialogue means she's signing) "without your past, you could never have arrivedâso wondrously and brutally, by design or some violent, exquisite happenstance ...here."
Flora chuckles. âThatâs true. Oh well, I guess Iâll just have to wait and see.â The fact that she was unable to bring Benvolio with her hardly bodes well for her future, but she ignores that. âPlease tell me you two are actually taking a bit of time off to go on a honeymoon at least.â
And you know weâll support you, no matter what. Abigail has no intention of becoming one of those married women who only uses the plural singular pronoun, but in this situation she feels comfortable speaking for Charles as well, and it hadnât escaped her notice that Flora was here without a date. We will, just not yet. Iâm almost finished with my mediwitch training, so weâre going to wait until thatâs over, and then travel in the summer. No one wants to be in London in August, anyway.
Charles had never really been the sort to be entertaining people, but if there was ever a time and place, he supposed it was at his and Abigailâs wedding. He was a bundle of nerves, but in a way heâd never really been beforeâexcept maybe when Abigail first agreed to go on that very first date with him. This was leagues better. When she caught his eye, he couldnât help but smile. A quick signed Of course, before he excused himself from who he was talking to find himself by her side, his fingers slipping between hers as they made their way from the crowd. Hello, Mrs. Bones. What can I help you with? he signed, unable to keep the grin off his face as he asked, before pressing a kiss to her knuckles.
With a polite smile, Abigail slips away from the guests around her. Her face transforms into a soft, warm smile just for Charles as she catches his hand in hers and leads him out of the ballroom. She feels giddy, seeing her husband call her Mrs. Bones, and she hopes the feeling never goes away. When he kisses her knuckles she catches his face and kisses him on the mouth, because she can kiss her husband absolutely whenever she pleases. She pulls away and smiles. I just wanted a quiet moment with my husband.
She grins, âI knew I could count on you, how could i give up on love when Iâm surrounded by it all the time? Edgar and Sarah, you and Charles. Iâm around love all the time.â She sighs and looks around the room. âIâve just got to focus if I want to be in the Wizengamot before this war is over,â she shrugs. âHolding off on relationships for awhile seems like a fair trade off.â
Originally posted by supremeclexa
Abigail nods in agreement. It is, after all, what she herself had decided to do when she moved to London, but... âJust keep yourself open. You never know when the right person is going to fall out of the sky.â
As a small child, Abigail thought she was a princess, and her mother a beautiful queen, all part of the happily ever after at the end of a fairytale. But even though they got along quite well, the match between Claudia Ellery-Norton, passionate, gregarious, and a touch whimsical, and Martin Norton, determined, reserved, and nothing if not level-headed, was a loveless one. Beatrice Norton, who lived with her son and his family, had arranged the match hoping the rising star would lend a touch of glamour to the Norton name, and thus give them a leg up in social circles, but was never particularly attached to her daughter-in-law. So when Claudia died, while she was publicly mourned to the pinnacle of politeness that the high society (which the Nortons were almost a part of) demanded, no one grieved her but her 6 year old daughter. This led Abigail to the mistaken but inevitable conclusion that she felt all things more deeply than normal people, and she was best just to keep it all to herself.
After Claudiaâs death, Beatrice took over as Abigailâs mother-figure and began shaping her into the society wife Beatrice had no doubt she would one day be. As far as Beatrice was concerned Abigail showed every sign of being a polite, practical, and proper Norton to her core, and this combined with the beauty, inherited from Claudia, that Abigail was already starting to show, would be the familyâs ticket to breaking into Wizarding Society once and for all. The only thing that could stop Beatriceâs plan was the only secret Claudia had ever kept from her family, Abigail had yet to show any signs of magic. Claudiaâs solution to this problem had been to let it be, confident that Abigail would come into her magic at her own time in her own way. Beatriceâs solution was considerably more active, setting traps and tricks hoping to bully Abigailâs magic to the surface. Claudia never made Abigail feel less than for not having produced any signs of magic, but Beatriceâs approach slowly chipped away at Abigail, making her desperate to prove herself.
When Abigail was 9, she took matters into her own hands. She jumped off the roof,  hoping to trigger her latent magic with a near death experience. Instead of floating gently to the ground, or bouncing upon impact as sheâd expected, Abigail plummeted, landing awkwardly on her head. Her father found her shortly, crumpled and bleeding out of her ears, and rushed his young daughter to St. Mungo. A team of mediwitches and healers did their best for Abigail, but they were unable to prevent partial hearing loss. Ever since that day, Abigail has been fully deaf in her right ear, and hard of hearing in her left. After this, Martin finally put his foot down, banning all attempts to spark his daughterâs magic. He said, if she was a squib, she was a squib, and there was no changing it. Martin was wrong on one count, though, because Abigail wasnât a squib, and the letter that proved it arrived promptly on her 11th birthday.
Adjusting to the change was difficult for Abigail, especially since Beatrice was more concerned with hiding her granddaughterâs âdeficiencyâ than helping her learn to live with her hearing loss. Hearing aids were deemed too obvious, so earrings were commissioned with a custom charm to help Abigail pass as hearing, and then Beatrice did her best to act as if nothing had changed. It was in the muggle village near Norton House that Abigail found the support she really needed. A working-class Deaf family with a daughter her age welcomed her into their home, teaching how to sign and about the community she was now a part of. The Mullins family was unlike any Abigail had ever met, warm and friendly, open and earnest. For Abigail, knowing them was like looking through a window into an alternate reality, one where life was simple and families were loving and one that was utterly unreachable. She was only a part of their world for a couple years, until Hogwarts pulled her more thoroughly into the wizarding world, but she would never forget the Mullins, or their daughter, Susan.
For most of Abigailâs early years, just getting a Hogwarts letter had seemed almost too much to hope for, and after she got it, all that mattered was that she be sorted into Ravenclaw, like her mother. Instead, the hat put her in Hufflepuff, hoping that being with other children who had just as much potential for kindness and compassion as she did would help Abigail grow into the good hearted person she could be. It didnât work. If anything, the plan backfired, as Abigailâs anger led to her resolve to be the least Hufflepuff student to ever actually be in Hufflepuff. She would not be nice, she would not be helpful, she would not be loyal to any high-minded Hufflepuff ideals. Instead, Abigail aligned herself with the sort of upper class Slytherins she knew her grandmother would approve of, and poured all of her considerable drive into being the kind of girl that her schoolfellows would admire, or at least fear. For a while, everything worked out for Abigail. She performed, if not spectacularly, then well in her classes. She had, if not close friends, then strong allies. She was, if not strictly in love with her boyfriend, then prepared to enter a partnership with him when the time came. Best of all, most days she was able to dismiss the ache of wanting more as simply missing her mother and summarily ignore it.Â
Things started to change on Abigailâs 17th birthday, when she came into her inheritance. Claudiaâs death had been unexpected, but sheâd still had a will, largely perfunctory, but the contents of her writing desk were left to Abigail and, per Martinâs decision, laid aside until she came of age. The bulky parcel arrived promptly in the middle of breakfast, and, once she realized what exactly it was, Abigail spent the rest of the morning sorting through it. Much of it was ultimately classified as trash, the natural detritus of a woman in the midst of her life, but Abigail handled every broken quill, every scrap of a crossed out, almost note with the utmost reverence. Once she was done, Abigail was left with a collection of journals, the latest one barely a quarter full, stationary she remembered watching her mother write thank you notes on as a child, and a bundle of letters, tied with a girlish ribbon and worn in ways that spoke of frequent rereads. Initially, Abigail thought they were love letters from her father, the naive assumption of a girl who, despite her own protests, still desperately wanted to believe in fairytales. But as the months passed and Abigail read and reread the letters it became impossible to deny that this was not the case.
Every girl must face a moment when she realizes, irrevocably, that her mother is a flesh and blood woman, human and fallible, with a life and thoughts and dreams that have nothing to do with them. Claudiaâs death postponed this moment for Abigail, but the reality came crashing in as Abigail worked her way through the letters, which were from the three years prior to Claudia and Martinâs wedding, and her motherâs journals, which spanned the entirety of the Nortonsâ marriage. The understanding that Claudia had been in love with someone else before she married Martin and, if her journals were any indication, continued to love him long after she wed another man, shook Abigail to her core. Worse still was the pervasive sadness in Claudiaâs journals that only lifted when she wrote about Abigail, and the unavoidable theme of deep regret and dissatisfaction with her marriage. Claudia had entered an arranged marriage for the good of her family, something Abigail had been trained to do by her grandmother from a young age, and regretted it. Abigail became determined not to make the same mistake.
She set her sights on love, but what she found instead was a volatile relationship equally full of fights as it was good times. She thought she was doing what her mother would have wanted her to do, following her heart, but really, she was throwing herself head first into the hands of a man who made her heart beat faster out of fear as much as any other reason. She planned to run away with him, to elope right after she graduated, and was one again saved from a life she didnât truly want by the arrival of a package, smaller this time, from the executor of her motherâs will. It contained only a letter, one that had been separated from the rest of the contents of Claudiaâs desk and lost for a time. It was sealed but unaddressed and yet written on stationary that was unmistakably Claudiaâs, a last letter to the man sheâd loved as a girl, written around the time Abigail was 5. The contents of the letter, which was still a love letter despite the time and distance that had separated Claudia and her mystery man, was enough to give Abigail pause, and the fight resulting from her newfound reluctance to elope was enough to drive her to sever ties completely.Â
Months went by and Abigail drifted, unsure of what to do with herself or even who to be, and unwilling to go to anyone in her family for guidance. She might have drifted straight into a sensible, arranged marriage of Beatriceâs design were it not for Martin who, despite being a distant and uninvolved father overall, did in fact care about his daughterâs well being and, sensing that something was wrong, though he couldnât tell what, made tentative overtures to bring Abigail into the family business. It didnât take long to suss out that the design and manufacturing of custom racing brooms for NQL teams was not Abigailâs cup of tea, but working toward something again, and most importantly something that had nothing to do with any kind of marriage, sparked something in Abigail and she remembered a time, long ago, when sheâd wanted to be a mediwitch. With nothing better to do and her fatherâs support, Abigail set off for London to achieve her childhood dream, and hopefully find herself along the way.
Abigail found everything she was looking for in London, and she found so much more. Training to be a mediwitch gave her something to strive for that wasnât meeting her grandmotherâs exacting standards or being marriageable. She was able to contribute to society in a way that felt meaningful to her, and it nurtured her long-starved compassion. She never lost the penchant for seeing and speaking the truth, even when uncomfortable, that was part of what made her Abigail, but she softened somewhat, learned to couch observations in kinder terms and be less blunt. When she went to a concert one night to blow off steam, she certainly wasnât looking for love. In fact, sheâd decided she was bad at love, and sworn off relationships and romance of any kind. But love was still looking for her, and it found her that night in the person of Charles Bones. They had a long and slow courtship, one where Charles was hesitant and Abigail was gun-shy, but the day that they got married was the happiest Abigail has ever been. Now, with a new ring on her left hand and her graduation from mediwitch training on the horizon, everything seems to be coming up Abigail.
âFrom what I hear, it almost never is.â She pauses and looks around the room, processing the day. âWait, did Sarah and Edgar recruit you too? Youâre not going to start trying to set me up are you?âÂ
âNo, never. I donât really see how setting someone up could ever work.â Abigail laughs a little at the expression on Ameliaâs face. âI just donât want to see you give up on love.â
Setting her plate on the table next to them Amelia wraps an arm around Abigailâs shoulders. âYou deserve all the happiness in the world.â With a quick squeeze, she lets her arm drop. âSeriously, you and Charles are so good together and for each other.â
âYou do too.â Abigail returns Ameliaâs half hug. âWe are, but it wasnât easy finding each other.â Abigail runs a finger over her wedding ring thoughtfully. She had a particularly rocky road to love, but there are some things even Amelia doesnât know.Â
âAnd they went to good use. The place looks amazing.â She smiles, reaaching over and squeezing Abigailâs hand briefly.  âI know itâs cheesy when people say this, but I think sheâd be really proud of you. You found a good one with Charles. I canât think of any sane person that would dislike him. I know Iâd be lucky to find something like you two have.â
I know, itâs perfect. Thereâs no arrogance or self-congratulation on her face, sheâs just excited, ecstatic to have married the love of her life in a beautiful ceremony. Abigail squeezes Floraâs hand in return. I hope she would be. She knows sheâs not making the decision that her mother made, but she hopes her mother would see that sheâs making a better one. I really did. Abigail smiles, but it turns a little sad as she looks at Flora. I never thought Iâd find happiness like this, you never know what life has in store. But she does know that Flora has chosen a different path for herself.
âAlright then, Mrs. Bones.â Flora grins. âIâm glad you two decided to go for a short engagement. I mean it took you long enough to get engaged. As maid of honor, itâs my duty to tell you it took you too long. But youâre here! And you look amazing.â
There wasnât really any point in waiting, and I was finally able to use all the party planning and hostessing lessons my grandmother taught me. Abigail rolls her eyes at Floraâs teasing, but she can smile about it now, because all of the waiting and the wondering is over. She smooths her hands over her dress. Itâs styled after my motherâs. Itâs like having her here with me.
âLet Jolie know this is deliciousâ She grinned, pressing her fork down into the plate to get the last crumbs of cake. âWelcome to the family! How does it feel to officially be a Bones?âÂ
âAmazing.â Abigail tears up a little just thinking about it, then laughs at herself. âThere were times when I thought Iâd never be this happy, that it wasnât possible to be this happy.â
âAbigail, it was beautiful.â She grins at her friend, bumping her gently with her hip, hands holding a plate. âI know lots of important things happened today, but, where did you two get this cake?â She ate another forkful, âIt is excellent.â
âThank you.â Abigail grins and bumps Amelia back. âJolie made it, it used to be my motherâs favorite recipe.â
Flora is beyond excited. Her two best friends finally got married, and while sheâll probably be jealous later, sheâs thrilled for them now. She grins at Abigail. âAm I going to have to call you Mrs. Bones now?â
Abigail is certain sheâs never been more happy. The whole ceremony had gone exactly as sheâd planned it, and everyone seems to be enjoying the reception. Sheâs finally married, and only one thing is missing. She waves to catch her new husbandâs attention, then signs with her hands low and close to her body, Can we sneak away?
âHonestly, one month was plenty of time. The most difficult part of the planning was deciding who would be ring bearer and who would be flower girl.â
Charlesâ hands started to shake. Less from nerves and more from excitement. There had been part of him that was certain that Abigail would say no, but that was blown far away because here in this moment, Abigail Norton had said yes. She was going to marry him. He tried to say something but it came out all jumbled, instead he laughed and shook his head a bit, opening the box.
Inside was the ring that heâd bought with Flora. It was the engagement ring half. The wedding band was tucked away elsewhere. He pulled it out and tucked the box in his pocket. Charles wanted to remember every bit of this and commit it to memory so every motion was deliberate. Charles took Abigailâs hand in his and slowly slid the ring on before holding her hand in his. Smiling a moment before looking back up to her. He leaned to give her a kiss before pulling her into a hug. âTh-Thank you. I l-love you. S-So m-much.â
Abigail places one hand gently on Charlesâ cheek as he stumbles over words to let him know that itâs okay. He doesnât need to say anything right now. In this one, blissful, perfect moment all he needs to do is put the ring on her finger. As he does so, the tears that have been threatening start to fall. She wipes them away impatiently, but sheâs still smiling.Â
She holds on tight when he pulls her into a hug, pressing her left ear to his chest so she can hear the beating of his heart. Sheâs sure she could stay like this forever and never need anything other than his arms around her. Thereâs nothing to say that he hasnât already said, so she just repeats him. âI love you. I love you, thank you.â
