S E P T E M B E R 1 9 9 9
i s o b e l
The first day her mother went back to work, Isobel visited Sandhaven Beach.
The next, she visited Scarborough. A little further away, and a little more to see.
The day after that, her mother worked a twelve-hour shift, so Isobel had more time. She Apparated to Manchester, and walked around the city there for a while, visiting museums and cathedrals. She bought ice cream from a market stall and sat with it on the steps of an art gallery, watching the crowds of muggles pass her by. Then she Apparated to Liverpool, and watched the sun go down from a white, sandy beach.
She visited many places, but decided she liked beaches the best. There was something enchanting about standing at the edge of the water with her toes curling into the sand, waves drifting back and forth around her ankles. Staring out at the vast expanse of ocean. Nobody knew much about her, anymore, but staring out at a world so big, that didn't seem to matter. The world was big enough to hold a life for her, somewhere, though she didn't know the details of that life quite yet.
She left the house soon after her mother went to work each day, to buy herself as much time as she could get. When she returned, she changed into her sweatpants, curled up with a book on the couch and pretended she had been there all day long.
The morning of Maggie's first shift at St. Mungo's, she had sat Isobel down at the kitchen table.
"Don't leave the house. Please."
Isobel had looked into her mother's pleading eyes, and lied. "I won't."
"And don't take off your necklace. Not under any circumstance, okay?"
"I won't," Isobel had replied, closing her fingers around the silver star at her neck. That part, at least, wasn't a lie.
But she had left the house. She had gone to many different places, and soaked in each one. Relished in the crowds drifting by, the people, the architecture, the landscapes. So many new things to see; so much that she had missed out on for so long.
She had gone to many places, but not enough. She wanted to go further.
Today though, she was going as far as her mother's room, for the first time since she had tucked her into bed after finding out what she had done. She was sacrificing another trip to Scarborough today, to search for Floo Powder.
Her mother was much better at Apparating than Isobel was, and had no problem Apparating back and forth to London everyday for work. But Isobel had learnt to Apparate at sixteen, and was not yet very good. Apparating long distances was tricky, and she could think of few things more terrifying than getting splinched while alone. She could Apparate to Manchester, but could make herself go no further.
Isobel's mother had told her that she kept no Floo Powder in the house. But Maggie was a distrustful, fearful woman. Her fear of war and Death Eaters pervaded into every aspect of their lives, and Isobel could not conceive that Maggie had no preplanned escape route from the house, should some unthinkable emergency happen. They had kept plenty of Floo Powder in their old house, had used it to travel everywhere, and she didn't believe her mother would have so carelessly thrown it all away, to rely on Apparition forever. So, as Maggie left for St. Mungo's, Isobel snuck into her bedroom to look for the green powder.
Maggie had given Isobel the larger of the two bedrooms in the house. Furniture crowded Maggie's room, and Isobel had to squeeze between the wardrobe and the edge of the bed to get to a small desk in the corner. This was where she would start - carefully opening each desk drawer, lifting Maggie's documents, books and notebooks; all so deliberately gently that there would be no sign she had ever been there.
Secrecy had twisted its way into Isobel's relationship with her mother, for now. Her mother was sensitive; fragile after the war. Something had broken in her, too, when Isobel had been attacked in the battle - or perhaps far before, when her father had died. In the last few months, things had been tense between them. Isobel didn't know how to forgive an act that was so awful, but came from a place of such abundant love - and didn't know how to fix it, either. She wasn't yet sure how to undo her mother's actions: how to get off the path her mother had chosen for her. But for now, she could leave the house, she could explore, after having been inside for so long. She could find a taste of freedom without upsetting her mother, or getting her in trouble. So if secrecy was what it would take, that was how it would be.
There was no Floo Powder in the drawers of Maggie's desk, and Isobel was beginning to get restless. It was possible her mother had just thrown it all out, in a moment of panic, but she didn't want to believe that yet.
There was nothing in Maggie's nightstand but a picture of the two of them and her father; taken years before at a restaurant in France. All three of them looked sunkissed, happy and healthy. Isobel's cheek pressed into her mother's shoulder, no secrets between them.
Isobel set the picture down and moved to the wardrobe: a very tall, wooden thing, and her last resort. With a deep breath, she pulled the door open. She combed through cardigans, shirts, jumpers . . . And at last, with her hand reaching high to the top shelf, standing on the tips of her toes, her fingers brushed against glass. She stretched further, but her hand knocked the jar away.
Isobel cursed under her breath. Taking her wand from the waist of her sweatpants, she whispered, "Accio Floo Powder." But nothing happened, and Isobel almost laughed - her mother must have put a counter-spell on the jar, for fear of Isobel trying to summon it. As she was doing now.
She grabbed the chair from the desk and dragged it to the wardrobe. Clambered onto it to see - finally - the bright green powder, staring back at her.
But not just that.
Behind the jar of Floo Powder lay an old, folded piece of parchment. Just those two things, sitting there, waiting for Isobel to find them. No concealment charms, just a high shelf.
She hesitated for only a fraction of a second, not wanting to intrude on anything that might be personal to her mother. But, she supposed, her mother had stolen Isobel's personal life: surely Isobel was entitled to some intrusion.
Later, she would wonder what would have happened if she had never unfolded the parchment.
She would wonder at what point she realised that the writing was a letter, and that the letter was addressed to her.
She would wonder at what point she noticed that it was signed by Draco Malfoy.
Curiosity turned to confusion, to anger, to fear. Heart thudding, she read over it once, then once again. Then she climbed down from the chair, sat on her mother's bed, and read it a third time.
A letter so full of heartbreak, so sorrowful - yet so unfathomable.
Draco Malfoy, who had been her friends' sworn enemy since day one.
Draco Malfoy, who had heaped scorn and insults and ridicule onto all of them, at every given chance.
Draco Malfoy, who had been a Death Eater.
She took a breath, and moved her mother's chair back to her desk. Placed it carefully there, so that it looked just as it had when Isobel had walked in. She shut the door of the wardrobe, closed her hand around the Floo Powder, and made her way to the fireplace. And prayed to God that her mother had connected their house to the Floo Network.
