Flying Blind

Chapter 2 Teaching the Snapes

They returned home after the funeral, neither of them wanting to socialize with others. Severus, with Lucius’s help, had his home in Derby remodelled and improved to make it easier and safer for his blind daughter to navigate through. He had added two indoor bathrooms, stair rails, connected it to the floo network and also situated a potions lab in the basement for brewing his own potions in the privacy of his home. He also had comfortable furniture brought in to make the old house more inviting.

The day after the funeral, Ellenore decided to dress herself on her own. Narcissa had helped her to know which sections of closet had which colour clothing in it. She had chosen a black dress with a crimson coloured sash. She had done, what she thought was, a perfect job dressing herself. When she felt her way down to the dining room, the conversation in the room went quiet. On seeing how his daughter was dressed Severus covered his eyes and tried not to laugh.

She slowly walked toward the table and was almost there when Dobby the house elf came running into the dining room with a tray of drinks and slammed right into her, knocking her backwards. Lucius screamed at the top of his lungs at the clumsy house elf and Ellenore covered her ears and cringed in pain. She didn’t stop cringing until Lucius had stopped his tirade. Draco got up from his seat and helped her to her chair between Narcissa and Severus. She ran her hands slowly over the table in front of her feeling for the location of her breakfast, and accidentally knocked over her milk; which dripped onto her lap, making her shiver.

She quickly found her napkin and attempted to clean the milk from her lap. Then she asked to be excused from the table.

“Aren’t you hungry?” asked her father with a concerned tone in his voice.

“No, daddy, this is hard, and my dress is wet.” She said, not wanting to embarrass herself much further.

“You’re wearing two different coloured shoes too.” announced Crabbe and Goyle whom had spent the night with Draco. Ellenore got up abruptly with tears flowing down her cheeks and slammed into a wall before she found the door that led out of the dining room. Draco got up and gave his two friends a furious look.

“When I get back, the two of you better be gone. You had no right to hurt her feelings like that.” He ran after her, hoping that he could catch up to her before she hurt herself again. He found her in her closet feeling for another dress. She was wearing her bathrobe and had left the dress and different coloured shoes lying on different areas of the floor. She had pulled out a silver dress with black trim and was about to take off her robe when he cleared his throat.

“Not that I mind having the chance to see a nearly naked girl, but I really don’t want to see you in that way.” She blushed and covered herself with the dress.

“You should knock before you come in.” she screamed in shock.

“I’m sorry, I did knock but you didn’t hear me because you had your head in the closet. Do you want me to help you find your shoes?” Ellenore got down on her knees and placed her hand on a pair of shoes.

“What colour is this pair?” Draco smiled as he told her the colour of each pair of shoes until she had found the pair that she wanted.

“Thank you Draco, you’re a good friend, but I got to say that Crabbe and Goyle have a lot to learn about being considerate of others.”

Draco left the room to let her dress in peace. After she had dressed she heard and felt her stomach growl loudly with hunger. She was surprised to find that Draco had waited outside of her room for her.

“Would you like to go back down to breakfast?” he asked. “Crabbe and Goyle should be gone and I can help you if you like?”

“Thanks for the offer Draco, but I have to learn to do this on my own, no matter how many times I get my clothes wet. Just help me back down please.”