Barefooted Heartbreak (HP)

chapter three

Luna Lovegood knows a lot of things. She's knowledgeable of things she shouldn't be, of things she'd rather not be.

She knows.

It comes from a foreign heartbeat, not her own; a hum inside her heart, stretching underneath her skin as to impact her every decision.

It's not her fault. (She'd be ignorant to everything if she could-- ignorance is bliss and knowing all too much but not enough at the time time is... not.)

It came from her mother. A women she can vividly remember and desperately wants to forget, with one large purple eye. She is (was) a cyclops. Luna knows-- like she knows Draco Malfoy has never learned to be more than his heritage, like she knows Snape to sneer in disgust at what he cannot understand because to try to comprehend is to try and let go-- that cyclops are hand in hand with Seers. The first of their people gave up their second eye in return for a glimpse of the future.

Luna is like her mother in some regards-- an out-there look painting her face, a skip in her step and hope in her heart-- and her bloodline is no exception. Luna is half-cyclops; the cause of her heterochromia.

She wonders if it's worth it and doesn't think it is. She is decidedly not normal-- not like them, not like anyone. She is known to skip class on the day of a tragic accident, a twinkle in her eye, and sometimes says all the right things.

But not often enough to matter.

She's not even like her mother completely. Her mother was knowledge in everything, she saw her fate and embraced it, but Luna is... not like that. She sees bits and pieces of the forecoming future, feelings only some of the "to be" "as is." Her power, such as she, is inconsistent without relent.

She cannot change that, though. As much as she wishes (and wish she does), there is so much of the world outside of her control. Terrible things happen all the time and she is not but a witness. (She would not be Luna Lovegood is she didn't try it be anything else, though.) She can change so little with her knowledge of a lot but not enough.

(She's not enough.) But even so, the sun still sets and it still rises. Life and the river of time gives no care toward the faults and follies of children, of schoolgirls not old enough to be grown but not ignorant enough to be a child.

Luna Lovegood is eleven years old and her world is falling apart around her.

Still, though, the days go on. She does what she can do-- which is only her best.

She wakes-- or doesn't, just gets out of bed-- and begins her morning routine. She opens her trunk, full of odd possessions all her own, and waved her hand over them. If it twitches, she accessorizes with it for the day.

It usually produced fashion disiasters. But it was Luna's way of seeing what objects would serve as useful-- what banana as a headband would serve to protect her, what necklace of bottlecaps would give her, what Robin called, "Good Vibes."

She thinks it works. (It might not.) So far, at least, she hasn't had any major mishaps. She'll stick with her little system, thank you very much.

Because Luna knows-- because Luna has been blessed with the blood of her mother with the eye to match, because Luna has never known normalcy but is hyper aware of everything else-- she knows, the evening before it happens, that everything is about to change. That everything surrounding her, that is her, is about to undergo an unchangeable shift.

Luna's not afraid. She know something big is coming and she's not afraid. She's looked death in the face and smiled. So a little change is not anything to fear in comparison.

It comes on a Monday-- which is already a shit day as id and this new deveplement to come is even more so unwelcome.

She's kneeling by her truck, her morning routine being habitual as ever, and hovering her hand over the items inside. Luna had just decided to shove garlic cloves in her ears when the event she was feeling would happen once the morning before, happened.

A spell. One shot subtly from the girl's common room stairs at her.  A white, glitter some mist all for her. It settles around her, seeping into her skin with a light, caste sensation. A gentle caress and then...

Nothing. There is not immediate impact of it-- her tongue stays attached to her head, her fingers still functioning. She doesn't feel particularly hexed.

So, Luna wonders, what's the change? The spell must've done something big-- that feeling in her gut that is a little more than instinct has never been wrong and it's telling her that that simple spell is more than a gentle caress. (It's telling her that her life will never be the same and Luna is inclined to believe it even if no evidence has round its head just yet.)

Deciding to let the cards fall where they may, Luna resumes her routine. She holds her hand out above a seashell ankle bracelet Robin gifted her and her hands twitches--

But along with this small display of her seer-esk cyclops power, a nerve searing pain surges throughput her body. She's kneeling on the ground, clutching her still throbbing eye, noting her right foot feels particularly numb when she realizes what the spell had done.

With every future telling moment will come pain. A simple part of her day to day life is, quite simply, is ruins. She doesn't know what life is like without demonstrating her ability to know what others do not. It's not like she'll be giving that up.

It's just that now, with every classroom disaster avoided, pain'll come, too.

Hmmmm, thinks Luna absently. I don't think I like this.

She stumbles down the stairs, wondering if Madame Pompfrey will be able to help and thinking she won't all the same.