Breaking Protocol {Percy Weasley}

Chapter Twenty

Christmas had approached the students very quickly, and Clara was both excited and saddened by that fact. Sighing, Clara watched as Felix took off into the cold winter air for the sixth time this month with a letter to her parents.

Since Clara arrived at Hogwarts, she had sent her parents a total of eleven letters, none of which they decided to respond to. She understood though, they were busy people with crazy work lives. Her step-father, Léo Blanchard, was head of a very large company that has grown in popularity over the past fourteen years. From what started as a small family owned business in the basement of his small house back in France, grew into a rich business, even catching the attention of many business men in the United States, and just last year Blanchard Corp. opened their first building in downtown Toronto, Canada.

Clara's biological father left her and her mother when Clara was only four years old. It was harsh on her mother, especially when Jennifer discovered Clara wasn't a normal kid, but a muggle born witch.

It didn't take long before a rich man like Léo to noticed Jennifer's stunning looks from where she worked behind that bar counter. It's a different kind of love, Clara's mother had tried to explain to a fatherless seven year old Clara, Léo is a trusting man, someone who can support and love us. He won't abandon us, Clara.

And Léo didn't, at least not completely. Léo worked long and tired hours, coming home late and frustrated from his stressful work days. The two barely saw the man. Clara often wondered if her mother only agreed to marry Léo because he could support the two of them. Jennifer was a hard working woman, but there was only so much pay that could come from a bartender job, and babysitters didn't come cheap even back then.

That didn't matter though, Clara loved that man like a father and despite not being around much it was clear that Léo loved Clara like she was his own. Clara loved her family, even though she was a constant reminder to Jennifer of the horrors she went through after she was left to raise an innocent child on her own with nothing but a minimum wage job to support to two.

It was clear in her mother's eyes sometimes, how much she regretted marrying Clara's 'sperm donor' as Jennifer called him, and having Clara at only seventeen years old. Sometimes Clara would leave to her bedroom just so her mother could pretend for a while that it was just her and Léo.

Clara hadn't realized she was crying until she rubbed her eyes and noticed her tear soaked lashes. Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Clara turned away from the Owlery ledge and made her way back toward the castle. She hoped her parents would respond to her this time, something as simple as an "I miss you" would be enough to get Clara through the rest of the school year, but with a painful sting in her chest, Clara knew that wasn't going to happen anytime soon.

Clara could tell it was dinner time as soon as she walked into the castle because the powerful smell of cooking pervaded the corridors. Wiping away any tears that lingered on her cheeks, Clara found a smile and hurriedly headed to the Great Hall where she knew her friends would be waiting. Her heart leaped in her chest when she realized she may run into Percy Weasley, but she found the panicked feeling subsided as soon as she laid her tired eyes upon the sigh of the Great Hall.

Christmas decorations had been put up, Clara assumed, sometime after lunch. Thick streamers of holly and mistletoe were strung along the corridors just before the Great Hall, and mysterious lights shone from inside every suit of armor. However, in the Great Hall, twelve Christmas trees, glittering with golden stars were lined up at the back of the room. It was truly a magical sight, something so heart warming Clara never wanted to leave the room.

Back at home, Clara's father had the staff of the Blanchard manner put up the Christmas decorations for them. They were beautiful indeed, but there was something about Hogwarts that brought a warm and cuddly feeling to Clara's heart, something she rarely felt at home.