𝐆𝐄𝐓𝐀𝐖𝐀𝐘 𝐂𝐀𝐑 [g. weasley]

chapter two

CHAPTER TWO

DAYS MORPHED INTO ONE ANOTHER, yet no scorning words were heard from my grandmother. After a while, I wondered whether she ever recognised our disappearance from the Avery House. I assumed not. Or else, she would've shredded the eerie stillness that heaved over the Grimmauld Place long before.

     The days were dull, and it was empty in the house, and it was silent. Many owls brought posts, and all were burned as soon as they arrived, no exceptions. Never a chance to read.

     At the dinner, we sat silently, surrounded by expensive china, courtesy of our name. "I have purchased your supply list," she said. "You do not need to leave the house."

     She didn't want me outside; that much was evident. But I could not blame her. The Ministry was failing, miserably for weeks, to track down Sirius Black.

     "D'you get the brush I wanted for Daisy?" I asked.

     Daisy was a white Persian cat with eyes as bright as the emerald ring Grandmother kept on her finger. I remember the first time I ever saw her, in The Magical Menagerie. It was the first fall of snow, glistening as it touched the ground, and she was staring at me through the shop's snow-covered window. Something instant flared between us, and since then, since I was barely eight, Daisy had been my most faithful companion within the sealed doors of the Grimmauld Place.

     "Yes," said Grandmother. "Kreacher has taken it up to your room."

     I nodded; there wasn't much to say. Shortly after, I excused myself from the table to pack my trunk for Hogwarts. Merely a week was left, yet Sirius Black was still running wild, nowhere to be found.

     I expected Kreacher to follow me up to my room, but he didn't. I saw why once I opened the door of my room.

     The room was neatly tidied, and my trunk had been packed, undoubtedly by Kreacher, and placed beside my nightstand. Daisy was curled up on my bed, her fur glistening under the city lights piercing from the window. There was an eerie calmness in the air, and I feared it was the calmness before the storm.

     Days went by with a book in hand, and soon it was time to board the train to Hogwarts. I woke to a grimacing Kreacher carrying my things down to the hall. I was cold, my right shoulder exposed to the breezes of the window, the one that faced the city.

     I had spent so many mornings alone in this room, in silence, I did not think it was strange to find it silent once more. The birds were up, and the Muggles, and even the portraits. I could hear their chatters filling the house. I sat up. Today, I was to leave for my fifth year at Hogwarts, one filled with excitement and pleasure and pressure.

     I left my room, and got greeted by the stillness of the rooms across mine. Cold and gaunt, I wondered whether the sun ever reached up to their doors.