There were different faces around her every day. Patients, her dads men, her men, strangers on the street in her apartment building. But Lydia was never one to forget a face, especially one that had been plastered around her home, shown up in emails and talked about over and over again until she thought her eyes were going to roll out of her sockets. But even then, with him sitting no more than ten feet from her, shallow memories from her childhood played in her head, barely glimpses but she remembered. Mostly. Before she could even think out a plan her legs were moving and walking to his table in the quiet coffee shop, taking a seat across from Niko. At first she thought maybe she was wrong. Time had worn on him and that was obvious but she recognized his eyes; cold. Harsh. Too much too soon. She let out a laugh, placing her hand over her mouth to muffle it so she wasn’t drawing so much attention. “You probably don’t remember me... Do you?” A slow grin graced her face, her forearms resting on the table as she studied him, red hair falling over her shoulder and off to the side.
He’d sent the boy an owl. Was given permission to use an unused classroom on the fourth floor west corridor for the purpose of the meeting. In the time between arriving at Hogwarts and the appointed time he’d requested the young man’s presence, Alastor makes the classroom more appropriate for a private conversation: desks vanished, the room dusted and lighted with torchlight in the sconces, and transfigured chairs--comfortable and just a smidgen overstuffed.
Seating himself in one of those chairs, Alastor patiently awaits the appearance of Ludovic Bagman. There’s every chance that the boy may try to ignore his missive. He’d been rather illusive since the incident took place. But within the castle walls, the head auror knows means of securing the boy should be be difficult.
“Come in, Ludovic.” It appears he means to be cooperative.
The sunlight was fading from the day, and Keller squinted out the window, surprised that time had passed so quickly. He had spent all day in the dorm, not feeling like going out and facing the student body, where rumour of what he’d done was spreading like wildfire. Keller assumed that people despised him for it – that they viewed their Head Boy as a failure – and he did not do well with failing something. Instead, he took to resting and reading and studying in his dorm, taking the day as it came. His entire shoulder and back was flaring with pain constantly, but his pride kept him from going to Pomfrey, and he subsided himself with potions to keep the pain at bay. The Ravenclaw boys’ dorm was quiet – Zane was out, possibly with Rosie somewhere, and Nolan was still in London. Keller frowned as he thought about his best friends; what would become of their tight knit bond now that Zane had experienced what it was like to be a werewolf, and Nolan had ‘died’? Keller hadn’t had a chance to talk to Zane about what had happened, nor had he had a spare moment to tell him about Nolan; it had only been two days since they’d returned, and yet, they’d spent that time sleeping or moving around and organising their lives now that chaos had entered into it – there just hadn’t been time. But, Keller thought, they had to make time; it was better that Zane heard about Nolan from him, rather than a whisper around school, which seemed increasingly more likely now that McGonagall was looking into what happened to Nolan. The book in his hands was forgotten, and just as Keller was about to close it, he heard footsteps on the stair and a moment later, the door opened, revealing Zane. Keller glanced up and gave his friend a small smile, noting the way that Zane still looked completely exhausted from London. “Hey,” he said, closing the book in his hands and placing it on the bed beside him. “How’s Rosie? I uh-… I haven’t had a chance to see her yet,” Keller said, frowning, and watching Zane enter the room. “I can’t imagine she’s too good, considering the school was surrounded by werewolves-…”
NOTES: Kalvin has a terrifying experience that changes things forever.
He was never really a prodigy, even though people considered him such, people who were easily impressed. Kalvin was just smart. He was clever, and problem solving came natural to him.
“What do you do when you don’t know the answer to a question?” his math teacher had asked his elementary school class once.
No one answered. Then one person spoke up, “That’s easy, you just ask someone for help.”
Kalvin had to groan. “Wrong,” he said. “If you don’t know the answer to a question, you go and find it yourself, otherwise you don’t learn.”
The teacher smiled at him, said “That’s absolutely right”, and went back to the whiteboard. The class grew to resent him as the year went on.
There was the good and the bad of school. Some people praised him for calling out the kid’s idiocy, and others bullied him worse than ever. Kalvin didn’t like their kind – the strong against the weak. He also didn’t like his own kind, the smart against the stupid. He didn’t ask for this brain, it was just…there.
The only ones who really bothered hanging out with him were his brothers. And even then, Kalvin thought that they must not want to be around the kid who sat against the wall and read books that were far too advanced for his age instead of playing kickball and tetherball and all the other games on the playground that made no sense. But literature made sense. There was no one there to change the rules when things didn’t go their way, it remained consistent.
Unlike his mother.
Her death was still fresh in his mind. In his nine-year-old brain, he tried to come up with reasoning that he knew was completely illogical. How she had to still be alive, even though he’d been at her bedside and had seen. Kalvin knew from his father’s face that she wouldn’t be back. Still, it was a bit disconcerting, not having her to wave him out of the house every morning and telling him to have a good day, which he never did.
I’m sorry; I suppose I failed you on that.
It still plagued all of them. Kalvin could tell, he was observant, but it was plain to everyone. Once the news got out, people seemed more sympathetic than usual. People would randomly come up to him in the halls and squeeze his shoulder, a few adults would ask him if he was okay. He wouldn’t say anything. He wasn’t okay.
Kalvin had nightmares, disturbing images that would plague his mind in the early hours of the morning, but it would only last for a few minutes before he was fast asleep again. There was one night, however, that shook him to the core so hard that recovery was impossible.
He was awake reading Harry Potter, the only thing that got him to sleep at night. The other children his age were barely reading chapter books at this point, but only a few of them had been placed in Accelerated Reading. Kalvin pushed his glasses up his nose (they kept slipping off and were starting to get small – or maybe his nose was just growing too big) and checked the alarm clock on his bedside table – 11:35 PM. Crap, he had to get some sleep. Yawning, he placed his glasses next to his alarm clock and marked his page in Harry Potter to go back to in the morning. He turned his light off and curled into the covers.
But he didn’t sleep. He wasn’t surprised; he was usually awake at night, ever since his mother’s death, Kalvin found himself bothered by tiny things, like that tree rustling in the wind, or that gate that was hanging off its hinges that cracked loudly against the pavement each time it was moved. But he wasn’t afraid of the dark.
Just afraid of what he couldn’t see.
Kalvin wasn’t sure if he was really asleep, but his mind was supposed to be shutting down, except it wasn’t. It was still active and working; and he whimpered and shifted in bed. It wasn’t a normal nightmare, he knew at once. This was more serious, it was terrible, and frightening. It was pure fear, not just the tension of fear.
He had to get out.
He willed himself, but it wasn’t enough, his mind wouldn’t listen and whatever that pounding sound was that pressed on his ears was getting closer. He turned around in bed, knocking over his glasses onto the floor and whimpering. Stop, he pleaded. Just stop.
Kalvin awoke with a start, his hair plastered to his forehead as he tried to reorient himself. He took a few deep breaths before covering his face with his hands. God, that was terrifying. He could already feel salty tears mixing with the sweat, and before he knew what he was doing, Kalvin was moving as fast as his small legs could carry him in the dark, glancing down the halls. His face was still wet, but he knew the way to Kurt’s room by heart. He knew the way to Cameron’s too, but Kurt’s room was closer, and so he made his way there. He knew Kurt had to be asleep, but he didn’t know who else he could wake up without annoying them.
And even as the seventeen-year-old Kalvin recalled this memory as vividly as it had just happened yesterday, he had no idea that he would spend the next eight years in pain.
