in the cards | marlene mckinnon

08. purely blood

Letter day, it was a joyous and awaited occasion for the vast majority of students at Hogwarts. There were of course outliers; those who received howlers or nastily worded sentences, and those who didn't have anyone to receive letters from. 

Marlene never quite knew which category she fell into. Her family was alive, to her relief, so she still received letters. However they were far too scarce and shallow for her liking. 

Maybe her parents got tired of sending letters every week, they had already done it with her brothers for years on end, maybe it got tiring? 

She knew her parents loved her; that was never a question in her mind, and she loved them the same back. Yet the strain of being The McKinnon Disappointment never failed to bring her down. 

No one ever said it to her face, but she could feel the cacophony of discontented eyes, scrutinizing her, every time she entered a room. It was blinding to a fault. 

Marlene was by no means a genius, she had never even insinuated so herself and certainly had no one around her either. But that didn't mean she was immune to the hushed whispers that haunted her mind. 

"Little Marlene, pity she isn't as bright as her brothers."

"Merlin, I can't imagine having a child like her."

"Poor McKinnon's, such a shame they had to have a girl. They had been so lucky before her, three boys. Michael and Eleanor must have been distraught when they found out."

She had been hearing the same phrases repeated at every family gathering or house party she had attended since she could talk. It was almost like they thought so little of her that they doubted she could even hear them. 

Her brothers never belittled her, if they could even qualify as that anymore. Had they ever?

The eldest, Jonathan, was eleven years her elder. They never knew each other, what would they have talked about as children, when their childhoods barely overlapped? 

He was engaged by the time she entered Hogwarts, his wife as boring as him. They lived next door, with their twin boys. To say her parents had been elated that he had settled down would be an understatement. 

Even if the McKinnon's weren't extremists, commonly known as blood supremacists, they still wanted their family line- and name- to be passed on. And Jonathan gave them that. 

Next in order was Matthew, the family's scholar. He brought up their family's academic standard by a lot, excelling all through school and then immediately joining the ministry. A highly respected and simple man; someone Marlene didn't recognize. 

Him being nine years older than her didn't help either.

Third was Christopher, the one closest in age to Marlene, only seven years older. Though for a child, that's worlds apart. 

When she was seven, old enough to understand and have a personality while all her brothers still lived at home; she tried. 

She asked to play quidditch with them, ride bikes around the neighborhood, do homework, anything really. But most things were denied by her mother, as she deemed them to be too masculine for 'a proper girl'.

She was confined to frilly dresses, piano lessons and various languages, while her brothers got to play and scream and laugh to their hearts' extent. 

So when Marlene got the third letter that semester, she wasn't brimming with excitement like the rest. She carelessly ripped open the paper, scanning the contents.