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unforthWhy, oh why, did I wake up at 8:00 when I'd not been able to sleep til 2? Stupid, stupid body. Wrote early today to give my brain time to wake up.
My parents were so relieved that my opportunity to impress the Black family hadn’t been lost that it never even seemed to occur to them to object to meeting Marcus and his parents at Diagon Alley. Instead, they fussed about the importance of making a good impression, and talked – always opaquely, of course – about how difficult it would be to do so without any money, and how they would have to lie about having a lot of shopping they intended to do and, indeed, how they’d have to go to all the stores and say that “how sad, they couldn’t find a thing they were looking for!” As such, they proceeded to make up the most outlandish shopping list they could, all the while my mother wondering which of her walking outfits had been least seen about town and my father hoping that lunch would be involved, grooms’ treat of course. This immediately sparked concern, for wasn’t it more typical for the ladies family to pay? My parents couldn’t decide. With a sigh, I took most of the funds that Zonks had given me the previous weekend and held it out to my father.
“I quite forgot,” I said, assuming the air of silly negligence that I always did at these moments; it wasn’t the first time I had given my parents money, and I could never do so without the pleasant little lie. “I didn’t spend all of my allowance this semester.” And he took the galleons from me. And my parents didn’t ask how I got the money. And they didn’t apologize for having to take from their daughter. And they both looked as mortified as they always did.
Still, I didn’t reckon on how much more than usual my business dealings had garnered. My father gasped and before he could stop himself – showing more emotion than I had seen in him since the first time I had done this – he exclaimed, “how did you get so much?”
My mother gave him a dirty look, and I shifted uncomfortable. “I…” I swallowed. “I don’t think you’d really like me to explain that. I came by it honestly, I’ve done nothing to be ashamed of or that needs to be concealed, and that should be enough.”
“Yes,” my mother said coldly, though I wasn’t really sure which of us that chill was directed towards, “you shouldn’t question your daughter about her allowance. You are such a generous father.” He nodded vaguely, looking at the handful – there were 12 galleons in total, a tidy sum in those days, easily enough to take a party of 6 out to dinner with plenty, enough for a small family to live on, cheaply, for about a month! – his face filled with wonder. I had a sick sense, wondering when the last time my father had held that much money at one time.
At least the exchange cut off all further talk of the following day. That was a distinct relief. To ensure that the change of topic was complete, too, Alasdair arrived. As he explained at length over the remainder of the evening, he was very important and couldn’t possibly be spared from the Ministry, and one of the prices was late nights. Alas for rank and authority! He despaired of getting any free time for anything, he was so desperately needed! He asked me, right at the start, how my semester had been, and interrupted me after a single sentence, going on about how school was especially important in this current day, that his own education was serving him very well at the Ministry. Indeed, that very day at the Ministry he’d been able to call in all his powers of arithmancy to resolve some very sticky points. And last week at the Ministry, he’d been able to resolve a very bad confusion about some paperwork, would have messed up all kind of logistics. He didn’t appreciate when I pointed out that this had nothing to do with his education, but kept on regardless. Without hardly pausing for breath, Alasdair regaled us with his “adventures” at the Ministry – using the word Ministry almost every sentence – and how important and indispensible he was there. My parents sat through it all with a stony sort of silence, and I wondered what the subtext was. There was something here I wasn’t quite seeing. It surely had something to do with the war; I had never seen my parents so on-the-outs with my brother before. Since listening to him was utterly dull, I used the time to try to puzzle out what was going on.
Last I knew, my parents had thought the war a muggle affair. However, in the time since the summer, more and more wizards had become involved. Indeed, I knew from my own experience that wizards even of the finest blood – the Patil’s, the Serences’, the Malfoy’s, not to mention the Black’s and, indeed, the Prince’s! – had been called in to work in support of the war on the front lines, or just behind. The Daily Prophet had run accounts of at least some of the WAP missions, and had been filled with reports of other wizards how had distinguished themselves on the front lines, while most often quietly bypassing those who met more unfortunate ends. A daily feature near the back listed the war dead, and there was at least one name every day, and if most of those were Continent wizards who had gotten caught up in things, more than one English wizard had died, too, and a few had done so with glory. This had been bringing certain house names to fame and, to some extent, to fortune in a way that a Ministry job never could have. I paused in this train of thought. Furthermore, Alasdair had yet to marry, didn’t have a place of his own, and had worked at the Ministry for almost 2 years without a promotion. What better time for him to further a political career, and to make an excuse for the lack of spouse, than to distinguish himself in battle! And here was Alasdair, babbling on about how necessary he was at the Ministry…yes, it made too much sense. Time to test my hypothesis.
“Oh!” I interrupted Alasdair mid-story, “speaking of the war, I wanted to speak with you briefly, mother, in regards to the Girl’s Auxiliary Brigade.”
“Indeed?” she didn’t sound happy, though she looked slightly relieved to have something else to talk about.
“Yes. I wanted to reassure you that it won’t do anything to bring shame to the family. Consider how much attention, positive attention, has been drawn to the boys in the Wizard Armed Patrol. As an extension of that, the Girl’s Auxiliary will only go to show that wizard women are just as brave as wizard men, and that we can do our part as well!”
“When you put it that way,” my father said thoughtfully, “then perhaps it is a good thing. This Relious fellow we’re to meet, he’s in that WAP thing, isn’t he?”
“Oh yes, he’s been on multiple missions to the Continent already. They’ve assaulted castles!” I eyed my brother and my parents while I made this pronouncement, and saw enough to convince myself my theory was correct. Alasdair’s face turned the most peculiar shade of pale and colorless, and he dropped his coffee cup. Meanwhile, my mother turned all the force of her good breeding in to an icy stare that spoke volumes that she would never say aloud. I wondered if, perhaps, my generally positive reception thus far was not perhaps because of how very out of favor Alasdair was!
Conversation continued in similar veins until the hour grew late, and I went up to my room, excited and pleased and very much looking forward to the next day. As much as anything, too, I was very happy that Alasdair’s disfavor reflected so well on me, and that my own accomplishments seemed finally to be impressing my parents. I went to bed with my thoughts full of happiness. Not only would I be seeing Marcus, not only did my parents approve, but I was finally becoming the daughter my parents had always wished me to be, even if I never would be in Slytherin.
My parents were so relieved that my opportunity to impress the Black family hadn’t been lost that it never even seemed to occur to them to object to meeting Marcus and his parents at Diagon Alley. Instead, they fussed about the importance of making a good impression, and talked – always opaquely, of course – about how difficult it would be to do so without any money, and how they would have to lie about having a lot of shopping they intended to do and, indeed, how they’d have to go to all the stores and say that “how sad, they couldn’t find a thing they were looking for!” As such, they proceeded to make up the most outlandish shopping list they could, all the while my mother wondering which of her walking outfits had been least seen about town and my father hoping that lunch would be involved, grooms’ treat of course. This immediately sparked concern, for wasn’t it more typical for the ladies family to pay? My parents couldn’t decide. With a sigh, I took most of the funds that Zonks had given me the previous weekend and held it out to my father.
“I quite forgot,” I said, assuming the air of silly negligence that I always did at these moments; it wasn’t the first time I had given my parents money, and I could never do so without the pleasant little lie. “I didn’t spend all of my allowance this semester.” And he took the galleons from me. And my parents didn’t ask how I got the money. And they didn’t apologize for having to take from their daughter. And they both looked as mortified as they always did.
Still, I didn’t reckon on how much more than usual my business dealings had garnered. My father gasped and before he could stop himself – showing more emotion than I had seen in him since the first time I had done this – he exclaimed, “how did you get so much?”
My mother gave him a dirty look, and I shifted uncomfortable. “I…” I swallowed. “I don’t think you’d really like me to explain that. I came by it honestly, I’ve done nothing to be ashamed of or that needs to be concealed, and that should be enough.”
“Yes,” my mother said coldly, though I wasn’t really sure which of us that chill was directed towards, “you shouldn’t question your daughter about her allowance. You are such a generous father.” He nodded vaguely, looking at the handful – there were 12 galleons in total, a tidy sum in those days, easily enough to take a party of 6 out to dinner with plenty, enough for a small family to live on, cheaply, for about a month! – his face filled with wonder. I had a sick sense, wondering when the last time my father had held that much money at one time.
At least the exchange cut off all further talk of the following day. That was a distinct relief. To ensure that the change of topic was complete, too, Alasdair arrived. As he explained at length over the remainder of the evening, he was very important and couldn’t possibly be spared from the Ministry, and one of the prices was late nights. Alas for rank and authority! He despaired of getting any free time for anything, he was so desperately needed! He asked me, right at the start, how my semester had been, and interrupted me after a single sentence, going on about how school was especially important in this current day, that his own education was serving him very well at the Ministry. Indeed, that very day at the Ministry he’d been able to call in all his powers of arithmancy to resolve some very sticky points. And last week at the Ministry, he’d been able to resolve a very bad confusion about some paperwork, would have messed up all kind of logistics. He didn’t appreciate when I pointed out that this had nothing to do with his education, but kept on regardless. Without hardly pausing for breath, Alasdair regaled us with his “adventures” at the Ministry – using the word Ministry almost every sentence – and how important and indispensible he was there. My parents sat through it all with a stony sort of silence, and I wondered what the subtext was. There was something here I wasn’t quite seeing. It surely had something to do with the war; I had never seen my parents so on-the-outs with my brother before. Since listening to him was utterly dull, I used the time to try to puzzle out what was going on.
Last I knew, my parents had thought the war a muggle affair. However, in the time since the summer, more and more wizards had become involved. Indeed, I knew from my own experience that wizards even of the finest blood – the Patil’s, the Serences’, the Malfoy’s, not to mention the Black’s and, indeed, the Prince’s! – had been called in to work in support of the war on the front lines, or just behind. The Daily Prophet had run accounts of at least some of the WAP missions, and had been filled with reports of other wizards how had distinguished themselves on the front lines, while most often quietly bypassing those who met more unfortunate ends. A daily feature near the back listed the war dead, and there was at least one name every day, and if most of those were Continent wizards who had gotten caught up in things, more than one English wizard had died, too, and a few had done so with glory. This had been bringing certain house names to fame and, to some extent, to fortune in a way that a Ministry job never could have. I paused in this train of thought. Furthermore, Alasdair had yet to marry, didn’t have a place of his own, and had worked at the Ministry for almost 2 years without a promotion. What better time for him to further a political career, and to make an excuse for the lack of spouse, than to distinguish himself in battle! And here was Alasdair, babbling on about how necessary he was at the Ministry…yes, it made too much sense. Time to test my hypothesis.
“Oh!” I interrupted Alasdair mid-story, “speaking of the war, I wanted to speak with you briefly, mother, in regards to the Girl’s Auxiliary Brigade.”
“Indeed?” she didn’t sound happy, though she looked slightly relieved to have something else to talk about.
“Yes. I wanted to reassure you that it won’t do anything to bring shame to the family. Consider how much attention, positive attention, has been drawn to the boys in the Wizard Armed Patrol. As an extension of that, the Girl’s Auxiliary will only go to show that wizard women are just as brave as wizard men, and that we can do our part as well!”
“When you put it that way,” my father said thoughtfully, “then perhaps it is a good thing. This Relious fellow we’re to meet, he’s in that WAP thing, isn’t he?”
“Oh yes, he’s been on multiple missions to the Continent already. They’ve assaulted castles!” I eyed my brother and my parents while I made this pronouncement, and saw enough to convince myself my theory was correct. Alasdair’s face turned the most peculiar shade of pale and colorless, and he dropped his coffee cup. Meanwhile, my mother turned all the force of her good breeding in to an icy stare that spoke volumes that she would never say aloud. I wondered if, perhaps, my generally positive reception thus far was not perhaps because of how very out of favor Alasdair was!
Conversation continued in similar veins until the hour grew late, and I went up to my room, excited and pleased and very much looking forward to the next day. As much as anything, too, I was very happy that Alasdair’s disfavor reflected so well on me, and that my own accomplishments seemed finally to be impressing my parents. I went to bed with my thoughts full of happiness. Not only would I be seeing Marcus, not only did my parents approve, but I was finally becoming the daughter my parents had always wished me to be, even if I never would be in Slytherin.
