eternally mine | pansy parkinson✔

s e v e n t e e n

howard.
Christmas break was the most agonizing period of my life. I barely had anything to do and I had barely gotten word from my father about anything. He'd slowed down with writing and I could only assume it was because he got tired of my owl nearly breaking his favorite pieces of ceramics.

I sat next to Dessa in the common room, my head thrown back on the backrest of the couch. Dessa had her nose planted in a book and hadn't looked up at me for an hour and a half. Isaac had, very last minute, decided he wanted to go home and booked it. That left us alone with nothing to do and only each other to talk to.

The plus side was we had a dorm to ourselves, seen as the other girls also went home to their families.

We were the only people in the common room, everyone else had decided to go to Hogsmeade to fix the boredom. I was tempted to join but I didn't want to leave Dessa alone so I stayed back for her.

She sighed loudly and looked over at me, slamming her book shut over a small slip of paper.

"He doesn't want anything to do with me," she blurted. "Draco. I talked to him the other night and I've just now processed it." She sounded defeated and I wasn't sure how to comfort her. I didn't know what she had wanted in the first place.

"How do you feel?" I asked, attempting to keep my response vague.

"At first I was disappointed, yesterday I kind of felt like shit. But now I think I'm okay with it? Like, I don't know, it makes sense to me."

I nodded at her and tried to read her eyes but she was too good. I got nothing more than what she spoke.

"And.." she trailed off, "I saw something. On his arm." I froze. My heart pounded and I didn't want to believe her.

"You don't think.."

"Oh I do. I wouldn't be surprised if all the Slytherins end up with it either."

I blinked at her.

No. 100% no. She wouldn't.

Would she?

"Really? I mean, not all of them are for Him, right?" I'm sure I did a shitty job hiding my tone and I know she could tell but she didn't say anything.

"I mean, yeah. But I don't think any of them have a choice."

I felt a flash of heat jolt through my body and my vision cut in and out. A tall figure looked around me and a cold grip was on my shoulder. I tried to pull away from it but I couldn't get away. Whispers echoed and it felt all too similar to the last time this had happened.

But different.

I closed my eyes and tried to drown everything out, but I failed. This time it whispered someone else's name, someone I'd never met.

I couldn't see or hear anything else. Everything was dark and the only thing visible was that thing.

Flora...

I jolted and my heart pounded. I felt myself coming back to my senses and Dessa's hands on my shoulders. I opened my eyes and looked at her, my breathing irregular as I tried to process everything.

"Adeline what the hell?" She was basically yelling and I didn't know for how long she'd been talking to me. "Are you okay, what the fuck?"

"Yeah I think so?" I said. I tried to focus on my breathing and calm myself down but I was failing big time.

"Shit, I don't know what to do!" She pulled me into her and wrapped her arms around me, holding me as tight as humanly possible. "You scared the shit out of me, holy fuck." She stroked my back and I could feel my body relax. I let myself melt in her arms and closed my eyes.

Dessa didn't let go of me until everything about me seemed regular again, but even then she was apprehensive to move. She seemed freaked out and I didn't know how to ease her.

At least we weren't bored anymore.

She took me down to the courtyard an hour later, a small group of Ravenclaws being the only people out there. It had slowly begun to snow and I quite liked the cool chill on my skin. My hands were exposed and it cooled the rest of me to a comfortable temperature.

"It so peaceful out here," Dessa said, leaning against the stone wall of the castle. "Usually there's too many people for me to focus for even a second." I looked over at her, a small smile on her lips for the first time in what felt like years.

Dessa hadn't been herself at all this year. Things were changing and she knew it. I could tell she hated it, too. Anytime someone mentioned change she scrunched her nose and went silent. Something had turned her away from the word.

Almost like she saw something lying under the meaning—under how people used it. Like she could hear it differently than everyone else. Similar to how she hated rain. She hated the sounds:

"Rain sounds too much like things falling. It's stupid, but it sounds, in my head, like everything I've ever wanted or hoped for falling to the floor and shattering."

It didn't make sense to me, it still doesn't make sense to me. But something in her brain hated rain as it hated change. Maybe it was because of the same thing. Maybe she didn't want things to change in fear that she'd lose things she has now.

All Dessa has ever expressed wanting in life is family. She wants her own family. She claims hers is too crowded and she wants something smaller to focus on. She once said that all her siblings made her feel invisible, even whilst being the youngest. She said she never wanted her own children to feel that way and had decided there was the magic number.

That's practically worlds away, though.

She liked snow, though.

Her cheeks were rosy red and she held her hand out for the snowflakes to fall into her palm. This was the only change she'd ever accept.

"I think we should play games tonight," she said. "Your dad sent you with that Muggle game, right?"

"Yeah, you want to play it?"

"Fuck it, why not."

She smiled. Truly smiled. This Odessa Young was the Odessa Young I knew. This was her.