Freaks: Year Two

Felix?

Felix was in a conversation with Jasper about how to find good balance on your broom (he had been struggling with the class and he had heard Jasper was quite good with flying tips) when the owls arrived with the post that day.

"Ah, I will never get used to that," Andy sighed, looking up at the owls in awe, letters and copies of the newspaper dropping across the house tables.

Garrett rolled his eyes.

"I saw that Fletcher," Andy snapped.

"Please, don't start fighting," Elijah said but he was cut off.

By Felix's scream.

Everyone in the Great Hall went silent.

"Felix?" Andy asked, her voice now a whisper. "What's wrong?"

But everyone already knew the answer.

It was there in his horrified grey eyes.

Someone he knew had been killed.

"Felix?" Jasper asked, his voice worried. The first year looked like he was going to faint. Jasper knew the signs and he was either going to be sick or pass out. Jasper quickly grabbed a goblet of water as a professor started to come down from the main table. "Have some wa–"

"My dad," he whispered.

Everyone at the Hufflepuff table was quiet.

His eyes filled with tears.

His father was dead. It said it in the paper. His name. Patrick Talisman. It was printed in the Daily Prophet. He was gone. Murdered. Dead. Gone. He was dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Felix didn't want to believe it. His father couldn't have been gone. He had just written to him yesterday, about the last softball game because that was their thing. In exchange, Felix had said how Ilvermorny was going to be coming soon and he had joked about getting the Americans and the British to have their own softball game.

Had his father gotten that letter?

There were people around him, he knew that but he couldn't see them, he could barely hear them. It was like they were a big blurry, muffled blob and the only thing he could hear was his unsteady, laboured breathing and all he could see was the words, dead, dead, dead...

Soon he could see nothing at all but his thoughts were still blaringly loud.

Dead, dead, dead...

"Do you think he's okay?"

"Of course he isn't! He bloody fainted!"

"Where's his sister?"

"She ran off."

"She should be here."

"This shouldn't even be happening!"

"Well, it is! So get used to it!"

"Shut up! Have some sympathy, you prat!"

"I'm trying to be realistic here–"

"What if he died too!"

"Oh, don't be ridiculous."

"Just calm down, you should be in your dormitories, not outside the Hospital Wing!"

"I want to make sure he's okay!"

"Where the hell is his sister?"

"Someone should check if she's okay!"

"What if someone else we know dies tomorrow–"