speak now | regulus black

6

AN: Just very quickly, I didn't realise that there was confusion about Sofia's name, so I'd just like to clarify that her given first name is Sofia and Sonya is a Russian diminutive. It's like a nickname used by friends and family. Just like Natasha is a diminutive for Natalia, and Vanya for Ivan.

♡

funeral – phoebe bridgers

"wishing i was someone else, feeling sorry for myself

when i remembered someone's kid is dead."

♡

When Sofia finally got out of the Hospital Wing and went back into the potions lab, she discovered that someone had gotten rid of the Death-cap she had left half-torn apart on her desk and now a little bottled labelled 'Death-cap gill extract' stood in its place.

Sofia had a sinking suspicion about who had left it there. She would have liked to think that maybe it was Slughorn, but she was pretty sure the man hated her now if the stern talking to and detention she'd gotten from him the second she got out of the infirmary was anything to go by.

She planned on getting some work done before breakfast, but just the sheer sight of that expensive little bottle made her feel unbearably... mad. What was Black playing at? Since when was she his charity case? It made her feel icky to even think about it.

So, she turned right back around and headed to the Great Hall for breakfast.

There weren't that many students when she got there, so she sat by herself. She peeked at her burn as she reached for the pumpkin juice. It was still kind of tender and she had to apply ointment on it three times a day but overall, it wasn't so bad.

A Daily Prophet owl spotted Sofia and she took the paper from it. She skimmed it, and right there on the front page was a headline that made her breath catch.

EIGHT DEAD ON ANTI-MUGGLE ATTACK

Sofia felt her heart hammering on her chest as she read the article. It had happened in London, not even too far from her neighbourhood. Some dark wizards had attacked a Muggle shop leaving eight Muggles dead. They didn't know the reason behind the attack yet, or even who had done it. She wanted to cry just reading about it.

Sofia knew the chance of any member of her family being anywhere near that shop she'd never even heard of was very slim. And even if that were the case, she figured she would have already been contacted, seeing as this took place the previous night. But still, that tiny possibility made her nervous.

She wished she could call them, at least to make extra sure they were alright.

Sofia practically snatched the letter her owl carried when it finally showed up a few minutes later.

The first half of the letter was just the regular stuff her siblings wrote about, school and whatnot, then almost at the end there was one paragraph, written by her mother that stood out.

Do you remember Rajan, from down the road? You used to play with him all the time when we first moved here. You liked him because he talked a lot and saved you from having to speak English. There was some sort of gas leak that caused an explosion down in a shop in Ealing and Rajan was there. He didn't make it. Just terrible. It made me want to hug you and your siblings extra hard when I heard.

Sofia placed a hand over her mouth. Of course she remembered Raj, they had stopped hanging out after Sofia's father had left when she had just been too busy to play anymore. But she still saw him around the neighbourhood sometimes and he was always happy to say hello to her.