many moons ago - mary macdonald

I

There was a little girl hiding behind a library.

It was not comfortable; it was very dusty and there was also an awful smell. The little girl was sitting on the floor, holding her knees tight and close to her chest. She was watching the thin line on the floor that the light of the sun drew entering the room freely through that little chunk of open window.

The calendar hanging on the wall next to the door stated it was the 24th July of 1971. The little girl, whose name was Mary, couldn't see it though, because her little hiding spot didn't allow her to see the door, but only the big window and the wooden wall.

Mary sniffed and swelled her cheeks to keep herself from sneezing. There was a lot of dust behind that library, but she knew it was the best hiding spot when playing hide and seek with her brothers.

Mary had two older brothers, Magnus and Brian, who were both bigger and smarter than her and she had to do her best to keep up with them. And that was the best way she could prove her value to them: by hiding in their father's studio, because he hated when they played there. Mary was sure they wouldn't have looked for her up there.

They were older, bigger and smarter, but Mary felt incredibly proud for being the bravest by sliding into the office and hiding behind the old library. She didn't even have to lock pick the door, which was weird, because her father always locked his studio. But little Mary just had to put her hand on the knob and the door opened. Not that she did really care at first, she was just overly excited for doing something dangerous for once.

There was not much to do, up there, though. She could have taken a book from the library and read it, but she couldn't deny she was pretty scared that if she touched anything, her father would have known someone was there. So her plan was to stay there the longest she could before she heard her brother Brian screaming that he gave up and that she won. A little smile drew on young Mary's face: that was the best feeling in the world.

A feeble distant noise alerted young Mary, who at first thought that her brothers were coming upstairs, but she soon realised that the funny noise came from outside. Slowly, she raised from the pavement and got on her feet and, after checking no one was in the room, she slid from behind the library and approached the window.

It was a sunny day; she could see the daughters of the neighbours playing in the front yard with a very old ball, in a way that she could say was very aggressive for three thin young girls. The neighbourhood was pretty quiet: there was a distant smell of barbecue and only the barking of some small dog bothered the calm of that beautiful summer afternoon. Some boys, a few years older than her, crossed the street in that moment, riding their bikes and laughing so hard they didn't notice that something was deeply wrong in that normal neighbourhood atmosphere. Actually, no one noticed, not even Mrs. Presley, that lived in the house just in front of Mary's, and that was the most nosy person she had ever met.

No one seemed to notice that, in the middle of that sunny afternoon of July, a fat, brown owl was flying through the unused chimneys and the identical roofs, directed exactly at Mary's house.

No one but Mary, who was very aware of what that owl meant: magic!

When they were eleven, Mary's brothers had received a letter that invited them to a mysterious magical school in Scotland and they had attended it ever since. It had been very difficult for their parents to adapt to the new lifestyle, with owls that wandered around the house and books of spells to buy every year, but for little Mary? Growing up with magic around her was a dream! Mary had turned eleven the year before, on October 18th, but the letter didn't came for her that summer. She couldn't help but being disappointed at first and she remembered crying until the first September, when her brothers set off for Hogwarts and she was forced to attend the muggle school. But with time she understood there was nothing she could do to gain magic: if she didn't have it, she didn't have it. However, she was still able to live by the crumbs of magic around her brothers' lives and that fat brown owl was one of them.