BREAK FROM TORONTO, HARRY POTTER.

CHAPTER THREE: "THAT'S A COMPLEX ANSWER"

CHAPTER THREE.

      Aveline was stuck in a room with Ginny Weasley and Hermione.

     Not that her little heart was complaining.

     All night, Hermione and Ginny pestered Aveline with questions about the future.

     "What's London like?"

     "Are there Dementors everywhere?"

     A few of the questions had Aveline laughing so hard that her stomach hurt.

     She also found it hilarious how Ginny and Hermione didn't know a single thing about modern day pop culture and slang.

     Though how could they? They were from the 80s and 90s in Great Britain. They wouldn't know anything about the 2000s and 2010s in America.

     "I have no clue what London is like," Aveline had said, "I'm from New York— well, actually I was born in France, but I moved to New York when I was 5."

     Hermione and Ginny had been fascinated by that.

     The next morning, breakfast was insane. Much to Aveline's dismay, Remus, Bill, and Tonks were absent due to Order business.

     Nonetheless, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Fred, George, and even Sirius, Arthur, and Molly asked Aveline question after question after question.

     They all froze in shock when Aveline pulled out her phone. "Wow. There's a signal!"

     "What the bloody hell is that?!" Ron asked.

     "This?" Aveline held up her phone. "My phone . . . ?"

     "How's it work?" Sirius questioned eagerly.

     "That's a complex answer," Aveline replied.

     "What's it do?" George inquired.

     "Um . . . lot's of things," Aveline shrugged, "I can talk to people, text people—"

     "Text people?" Arthur frowned.

     "It's like letters and owls. Except my phone replaces an owl and I use a keyboard to type my message and it gets received instantly," Aveline explained.

     "Wicked!" Fred and George exclaimed.

     "What else?" Hermione asked excitedly.

     "Uhhh, shit. I can take pictures . . . except these ones don't move like yours do. Unless it's a live photo. I can play video games on it. It does virtually anything," Aveline exclaimed then gasped, "all my contacts are gone!"

     "Contacts?" Molly asked. "What's that? Do you need them? Are they important?"

     "No, I— well, yes, but—" Aveline let out a frustrated groan, "I guess it makes sense. None of those people have phones here. At least everything else is normal . . . sort of."

     Aveline found that everyone she followed on Instagram was no longer followed and Instagram was virtually empty. Same with TikTok and Snapchat and her iMessages.

     She felt a little alarmed by this. She felt stranded and abandoned.

     Realization began to set in. She didn't know where she was or what she was doing. All these people around her were fictional. Simply characters created for a story.

     Aveline had no way of contacting anyone, not even her parents whose number she tried. It didn't even ring once before it said the number wasn't in service.

     She suddenly felt incredibly overwhelmed and scared. Tears welled in her eyes and a lump formed in her throat.

     Nobody seemed to notice as they were asking a million questions.

     Aveline had a longing for home and her parents. She wanted things to be normal because she was confused right now. This couldn't be real. It was a dream, it had to be.

     It had to be.

     Sirius was first to notice.

     "Are you alright, Aveline?" He asked. He stared at Aveline, concerned and confused.

     By this point, tears were streaming Aveline's face. She couldn't breathe.

     "Oh, dear," Molly gasped.

     "What's wrong? Why are you crying?" Ron frowned.

     "I—" Aveline tried, but the lump in her throat only grew and the tears kept coming. She stood up from the table and looked at everyone's concerned faces.

     Molly took a step towards Aveline and she took a step back. Aveline paused before running upstairs and locking herself in the first room she saw.

     Immediately, Aveline broke down into tears. She clutched her stomach as she sat on the floor with her back to the wall.

     Aveline hated being confused. Even more she hated being scared and confused. She was both of those right now.

     She always had dreams of living in the Harry Potter Universe. Of course she did, but now she was living that dream and Dumbledore was telling her that fucking Voldemort was trying to kill her? Or hunt her down? Something.

     Then he said Aveline was sent to the future. Which freaked Aveline out completely. And she couldn't ask her parents because she couldn't contact them at all.

     And then the whole Aveline's mother was a powerful witch.

     Aveline had no clue what that meant. Did he mean the mother she'd known all her life? Or another woman? The woman who would have sent her to the future.

     Dumbledore wasn't there for Aveline to ask, so she settled for crying. She didn't know who's bed she was crawling into, but their pillow would be wet tonight from tears.

     Aveline was so consumed in her mini meltdown that she didn't even notice the giant hippogriff in the corner of the room. 

TRIN,
aveline said #AutisticMeltdown <3